A New Compton Camera Imaging Model to Mitigate the Finite Spatial Resolution of Detectors and New Camera Designs for Implementation

Abstract

An intrinsic limitation of the accuracy that can be achieved with Compton cameras results from the inevitable fact that the detectors, which comprise the camera, cannot have infinitely-accurate spatial resolution. To mitigate this loss of accuracy, a new imaging model is proposed. The implementation of the new imaging model, however, requires new camera designs. The results of a computer simulation indicate that the new imaging model can produce reasonable images, at least when noiseless simulated data are used. In the future, more work is needed to determine if the use of the new imaging model will improve the imaging capabilities of Compton cameras despite the loss of sensitivity caused by the use of the new camera designs. Regardless of the outcome of this work, the results presented here illustrate that new models for imaging from Compton scatters are possible and motivate the development of further models that could be more advantageous than the ones already developed.