Transition to mammography in the regular computed tomography simulation and reconstruction software

Abstract

This paper presents a modification of the previously developed and maintained computed tomography simulation and reconstruction software for the mammography case. New additional modules are designed to process the mammography data. Mammography provides incomplete information about the subject taken from the limited number points of view but as a result has potentially minimized exposure to radiation for the biological tissue under study. We implement this method by providing new standalone independent mammography modules in our software package. These modules are responsible for creating the projections’ set according to the operator’s input of exposure angles, phantom’s structure, and other multiple recording parameters. These additional modules reconstruct the data from these generated sets of projections or take the real medical data as input. Contrast and features’ recognition are particularly important elements of the study due to the limited number of projections in set. Our software could be used in combination with any real commercial mammography scanner as well as for research purposes to train medical and physics personnel and study for novel methods of contrast and image enhancement.