Digital mammography with synchrotron radiation

The SYRMEP (synchrotron radiation in medical physics) Collaboration is planning to use a beam of monochromatic x-rays provided by Elettra, the synchrotron radiation facility in operation at Trieste (Italy), in conjunction with a novel silicon pixel detector to conduct research in digital mammography. A beamline dedicated to mammography is presently under construction in Trieste; it will provide, at a distance of about 20 m from an Elettra bending magnet, a monochromatic laminar-section (150×4 mm2) x-ray beam. This beam will illuminate in vitro samples and will be detected by a fixed silicon microstrip device forming a matrix of pixels. Digital images of phantoms having a size common in the diagnostic practice (150×150 mm2), can then be produced by scanning the sample itself in front of the detector. A prototype detector with a sensitive area of 24×1 mm2 and pixels of 0.5×0.5 mm2 has been built and tested. We present the current status of the SYRMEP beamline and a digital image of a mammographic phantom exposed to a radioactive x-ray source.