The PEPI (Photon-counting Edge-illumination Phase-contrast Imaging) project is developing a new compact X-ray phase-contrast imaging (XPCI) facility at the INFN laboratories in Trieste (Italy). XPCI performance is enabled by the edge-illumination (EI) technique, whereby an array of beamlets produced by a structured absorbing mask (sample mask) is analyzed either by a second mask or by the detector itself. This arrangement allows the simultaneous detection of attenuation (conventional imaging), phase, and ultra-small-angle scattering USAXS signals, being appealing for biological and material science samples featuring multiple interfaces or a highly granular structure (e.g., pulmonary tissue, additive manufacturing). The setup is suited for samples in the centimeter scale requiring phase/USAXS sensitivity and spatial resolution in the 10 micrometers scale. Thanks to the integration of a photon-counting detector (Pixirad1-PixieIII) with spectral capabilities (2 energy thresholds per pixel) XPCI will be combined with spectral/KES imaging to provide images with lower noise and/or an increased number of decomposition materials.

A Geant4-based simulation framework enabling to simulate refraction (i.e., differential phase-contrast) images in EI mode has been developed.
The simulation features realistic tungsten anode spectra and focal spot distributions, detector energy response, tunable masks (pitch, aperture, thickness), geometry, acquisition modes (double-mask, single-mask, conventional), and movimentation (stepping, dithering). The code of the simulation can be found at this link.

Journals

L Brombal et al.  X-ray differential phase-contrast imaging simulations with Geant4 (2022) J. Phys. D: Appl. Phys. 55 045102. 

L. Brombal et al. A Geant4 tool for Edge-Illumination X-ray Phase-Contrast imaging (2022) JINST 17 C01043.

Conferences

Brombal, L. et al. A Geant4 tool for Edge-Illumination X-ray Phase-Contrast imaging (2021) 22nd International Workshop on Radiation Imaging Detectors, 27 June - 1 July 2021, Ghent, Belgium.

Brombal, L. Spectral and phase-contrast imaging: from crystal-based synchrotron setups to detector-based compact systems (2022) 23rd International Workshop on Radiation Imaging Detectors, 26 - 30 June 2022, Riva Del Garda, Italy.

Di Trapani, V. et al. Unified Modulation Pattern Analysis algorithm (UMPA) for 1D sensitive X-Ray Phase Contrast Imaging techniques (2022) 23rd International Workshop on Radiation Imaging Detectors, 26 - 30 June 2022, Riva Del Garda, Italy.