Mammography Imaging Using a Harpicon-Based Image Detector

A high-spatial resolution imaging system employing lens coupling between a fluorescent screen and a HARPICON™ camera was evaluated as a digital mammographie imaging device. A mammographie image on the fluorescent screen is focused on the photoconductive layer of the high sensitivity HARPICON tube by lenses. The limiting spatial resolution in the 1024 × 980 pixel mode of the camera is about 60 um at an input field of 50 × 50 mm on the screen. Images of a standard mammographie phantom were taken at the monochromatized X-ray energy of 20 keV. The images showed smaller specks of microcalcifications and tumor masses than those discernible in images obtained with a conventional screen-film mammography unit.