XR3D SERIES: WHITE PAPER 2010

VOTI Inc.

XR3D SERIES: WHITE PAPER

2010

Confidential and Proprietary Notice This document is not intended for general circulation or publication and cannot be reproduced in any form without the prior written permission of VOTI, Inc. The information provided herein and any accompanying material is considered highly confidential and proprietary to VOTI, Inc.

Table of Contents
1. PURPOSE 2. XR3D SERIES VS. CURRENT CLASSIC BAGGAGE SCREENING SYSTEMS 3. THE ATTENUATION IMAGE AND THE ATOMIC NUMBER IMAGE 3.1. NORMALIZATION 3.2. FUSION 3.3. ATOMIC NUMBER CALIBRATION 3.4. MATERIAL DISCRIMINATION IMAGE BASED ON ATOMIC NUMBER 4. CONCLUSION 4 4 5 5 6 6 7 8

1. PURPOSE
The field of X-ray imaging has seen steady evolutionary advancement since being introduced many decades ago ray and has emerged as a powerful tool for reliable security screening The advent of dual-energy systems marked an screening. energy important milestone in this evolution when introduced several years ago, and this technology is now being used extensively for threat detection at critical points points-of-entry across the world. However, despite being able to produce entry a greater depth of data than prior-generation single generation single-energy systems, dual-energy systems still bear important energy capability gaps and have much need for improvement. Recognizing these deficiencies VOTI Inc has developed deficiencies, advanced XR3D technology aimed at enhancing security screening operations while maximizing detection capabilities. XR3D technology focuses on the three main areas of advancement as described herein: Detector Configuration new geo geometries Image Enhancement normalization and fusion algorithms Improved Detection calibration techniques and new colormaps VOTIs XR3D X-ray imaging scanner is a complete new system offering that incorporates innovative new ray hardware and software design to provide much much-enhanced X-ray security screening.

Figure 1.0 - XR3D

2. XR3D series vs. current classic baggage screening systems

In traditional systems, the X-ray generator is directed vertically at the detectors, with the bag or parcel to be ray scanned passing in-between. Considering it is placed in a Cartesian coordinate system , , , , with between. as its origin, the resulting scan produces an image that is a projection of the bag in the , , plane. Hence, the bag is fully revealed in the , , plane. The detectors being configured in a conventional L-Shape in Shape , , plane, also partially reveal the bag in , , plane. The drawback is that such systems are not able to present important information that may lie in the , , plane, (Figure 2.1). As such, this traditional approach has the inherent disadvantage of not capturing threats that are aligned with the , , plane.

Scanner Entrance

Scanner Exit

Figure 2.1

Left: An object placed in a Cartesian coordinate system Right: The image of a scan performed on a bag by a traditional screening system

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2010

The XR3D series provides an image far more revealing of the bag because the projection is not restricted to the ( , , ) and , , planes, but includes the ( , , ) plane. Also, the XR3D detector array is not configured to a conventional L-Shape, but rather to a proprietary, improved configuration that maximizes the detection of each surface. The result is a 3D perspective projection of the bag in every plane of the coordinate system. As illustrated below, the same bag is scanned in a XR3D series scanner (Figure 2.2).

Scanner Entrance

Scanner Exit

Figure 2.2

Left: An object placed in a Cartesian coordinate system Right: Suitcase scan performed with VOTI XR3D series

Knives and razor blades not detected in Figure 2.1 are clearly displayed with the XR3D series.

3. THE ATTENUATION IMAGE AND THE ATOMIC NUMBER IMAGE

Dual-energy systems acquire two different images, a High Energy (HE) image and a Low Energy (LE) image. The quality of both attenuation images (density information) and atomic number image (material discrimination) are based upon four different steps of processing High and Low energy images: Normalization, Fusion, Atomic Number Calibration and Material Discrimination Image based on Atomic Number.

3.1. Normalization In order to obtain high spatial resolution, the XR3D uses a larger quantity of detectors. Each detector has a unique sensitivity to noise and varying contrast levels with respect to HE and LE levels (Figure 3.1.1), because each row of photodiodes bears its own electronic properties.

Figure 3.1.1 - Left: LE raw image Right: HE raw image

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To obtain the best image quality while removing the noise between each detector card, a VOTI-proprietary normalization algorithm is applied to both images ( (Figure 3.1.2).

Figure 3.1.2 - Left: LE normalized image Right: HE normalized image This normalization is processed by measuring the minimum signal from the detector array when the X X-ray generator is not powered (V off) and the maximum signal when it is powered on (V on), but before a bag is scanned, at which point mathematical algorithms are applied to produce normalized images.

3.2. Fusion Without having to display both images, it is still necessary to get the maximum information on the screen; the images of high energy and low energy are processed with a VOTI-proprietary fusion algorithm that provides the proprietary most revealing image based upon the information obtained with HE and LE levels (Figure 3.2.1). .2.1).

Figure 3.2.1 - HE-LE fusion image

3.3. Atomic number calibration The atomic number is a basic chemical property of materials, which is quantifiable using dual-energy X-ray materials, dual systems. For the materials comprising several chemicals, the formula is:
. .

where is the fraction of total number electrons associated with each element and is the atomic number of each element. However, this formula is only valid for the lower energy levels. Actually, using X ray dual-energy detectors, the r X-ray dual effective atomic number is a linear function of the ratio LE/HE ( (Figure 3.3.1).

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LE/HE
Figure 3.3.1 Effective atomic number Vs. LE/HE ratio Consequently, it is possible to calibrate based on an estimate of the effective atomic number depending on the High Energy level and Low Energy level. To accomplish this, two materials with different effective atomic numbers are required to create a calibration data file. However, in order to get a more accurate atomic number it is necessary to obtain a good linear regression, so it is better to use more than two materials. The XR3D system is calibrated with Plexiglas, aluminum and steel. Also, since the detectors are not sensitive to temperature and humidity, like some other systems in the market, their calibration is always efficient and provides an effective atomic number with a high accuracy of more than 95 %.

3.4. Material discrimination image based on atomic number The dual-energy X-ray technique for generating discriminating images divides materials into three different categories in accordance with the chemical/electronic nomenclature of common materials: organic, metallic and in-between which is often referred to as poor-metal. The image regions exhibiting the signature of each of these categories are colored orange, blue and green, respectively. Actually, a colormap is called and applied in order to create the material discrimination image by using the information of the effective atomic number. The colormap conforms to an international standard, but not the algorithm used to build it. Indeed, while traditional systems use the same colormap for all their scans, VOTIs XR3D series generates and applies a new colormap for each new scan. The companys proprietary algorithms compute the colormap to be optimized and maximize the discrimination of materials in a same bag. It is based upon the analysis of the dynamic range of every image pixel. Consequently, the XR3D series is dynamic and auto upgradeable so it provides a very high capacity to discriminate a very large range of materials (Figure 3.4.1).

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Figure 3.4.1 Material Discrimination Image computed with XR3D series

4. CONCLUSION
Todays dual-energy systems, introduced almost a decade ago, have deficiencies that are clearly addressed with energy the enhancements and innovations represented by VOTIs XR3D technology in order to provide vastly-improved vastly detection capabilities for critical point-of-entry security screening applications.

Confidential

2010