HIGH-SPATIAL-RESOLUTION AND REAL-TIME MEDICAL IMAGING USING A HIGH-SENSITIVITY HARPICON CAMERA

A HARPICON(TM) camera has been applied to a digital angiography system with fluorescent-screen optical-lens coupling. It uses avalanche mult iplication in the photoconductive layer for high-sensitivity imaging. The limiting spatial resolutions in the 1050 scanning-line mode of the camera are about 30 and 50 mu m at input held sizes of 20 x 20 and 50 x 50 mm on the screen, respectively. For high-speed imaging, the 525 scanning-line mode at a rate of 60 images s(-1) can be selected. High- quality images of coronary arteries in dogs were obtained by intra-aor tic coronary angiography and superselective coronary angiography using a single-energy X-ray above the iodine K-edge energy.