A xenon ionization detector for scanned projection radiography: Xenon/Freon 13B1 comparison

In a companion paper, we reported on the construction and testing of a xenon gas ionization detector for use in line scanned projection radiography. Experimental results indicate that the detector has sufficient resolution for chest radiography, but higher resolution is required for mammography. Theoretical analysis suggested that a detector pressurized with Freon 13B1 would have better resolution and higher x-ray energy efficiency than a xenon-filled detector for energies below 60 keV. In this paper we compared, theoretically and experimentally, Freon 13B1 to xenon as the detector gas. For a 120-kVp x-ray spectrum, the detector filled with 2.0 MPa of xenon had less channel-to-channel crosstalk, a higher quantum efficiency (QE), and twice the output signal than the detector filled with 1.4 MPa of Freon (highest possible pressure at room temperature), while for a 60-kVp spectrum, crosstalk is the same, but the detector has slightly higher QE and 1.4 times the energy efficiency when filled with Freon instead of xenon. We conclude that xenon is better for high-kVp imaging, while Freon at a lower pressure is slightly better for low-kVp imaging.