Edgar Göderer developes a preamplifier for better X-ray images
You can weigh objects or count them. Both are methods of finding out how much of something there is. In the case of X-ray imaging, it has long been the case that the process was more like weighing photons than counting them. "You can think of X-ray photons like beads," explains Edgar Göderer. "In classical X-ray, for example, you have a bucket full of beads and you simply weigh their weight. With our method, we count how many small, medium and large beads are in that bucket. And that gives us a more colorful and contrasty image."
Edgar Göderer in front of a magnified view of the pixel electronics containing the preamplifier.
What we've developed for imaging in X-ray can be thought of as going from black and white images to 4K in color. It sounds exaggerated, but it's not.
Edgar Göderer, Head of Analog Electronics Development in the CT Detector Center at Siemens Healthineers, Forchheim, Germany
Making every single X-ray photon visible
Core of the technology: semiconductor chips like this one are built into the CT and contain about a thousand tiny preamplifiers.
The result is “simply magic”
Edgar Göderer holds a so-called wafer in his hands. These very thin discs are mainly made of silicon. They contain many individual semiconductor chips that are later detached.
Edgar Göderer during adjustment of the detector module in an X-ray measuring chamber.
Edgar Göderer, Anna Gabiger-Rose (chip component responsible), and Michael Hosemann (head of digital electronics).