IMPS III 2D CT Control Module

The IMPS III 2D CT Control Module provides three main software tools:

• 2D CT Wizard - allows users to quickly set up and scan a component to obtain 2D CT data.
• 2D CT Reconstruction - allows users to refine reconstruction from existing acquisition data.
• Contour File Creator Wizard - guides the user through the necessary steps required to generate 3D Contour files from stacked 2D slice data.

2D CT Wizard

The 2D CT Wizard facility allows users to quickly set up and scan a component to obtain 2D CT data. The 2D CT Wizard, is a software tool designed to lead the user through the entire sequence necessary for successful 2D CT data acquisition and reconstruction. The Wizard leads the user through a number of distinct steps, from selecting:

In the final step slice acquisition and reconstruction is performed simultaneously.

On completion of the Wizard repeat runs may be easily performed on the same sample to refine the acquisition and reconstruction parameters. If no changes are acquisition and reconstruction can be started at the click of a button!

2D CT Reconstruction

In addition to the 2D CT Wizard, a separate 2D CT Reconstruction tool is also provided. The main purpose for this tool, is to refine the reconstruction of 2D CT slices from acquisition data already obtained using the 2D CT Wizard, or to reconstruct comparable data obtained from other systems.

Functions include the setup and editing of CT acquisition parameter files, volume definition (resolution, cur off radius, region of interest), output data type selection, tools for determining the centre of rotation, inverse filter selection, beam hardness correction, amongst others.

Contour File Creator Wizard

The Contour File Creator tool utilises a wizard interface to guide the user through the necessary steps required to generate 3D Contour files from stacked 2D slice data. The Contour File Creator Wizard allows a user to export reconstructed 2D CT slices, which have been acquired as a series or stack, in two different file formats:

• DXF (AutoCAD Drawing Interchange/Exchange Format) is a CAD (Computer Aided Design) graphics file format created by AutoDeskTM but supported by almost all CAD products on personal computers. A DXF file is basically an ASCII (American Standard Code for Information Interchange), or text file where the 2D and 3D components represent a drawing and as such can be opened using a suitable CAD application allowing in-depth analysis and measurements to be made.
• Point Cloud file (TXT file extension) stores the extracted contours as a series of points and is also saved as a standard ASCII text file. This format can also be opened by CAD applications although some may require a plug-in to be installed first.

Both of the file formats greatly increase the portability of the CT data by storing the measurement accuracy but without the space needed to hold all of the slice image files.