A THREE-DIMENSIONAL DISPLAY FOR EMISSION COMPUTED TOMOGRAPHY

THE OBJECT OF THE PLANNED RESEARCH IS TO DEMONSTRATE THE FEASIBILITY OF PRODUCING A TRUE THREE-DIMENSIONAL (3-D) DISPLAY FOR VIEWING THE IMAGERY PRODUCED BY EMISSION COMPUTED TOMOGRAPHY SYSTEMS IN THE FIELD OF MEDICINE. THE ULTIMATE OBJECTIVE IS TO DISPLAY HARD AND/OR SOFT COPY COMPUTER-GENERATED HOLOGRAMS VERY RAPIDLY. DURING PHASE I OF THE PROGRAM, A HOLOGRAPHIC DISPLAY INSTRUMENT (HDI) WILL BE IMPROVED BY ADDING A SPATIAL LIGHT MODULAR (SLM). THIS WILL PERMIT IMPROVED PICTURE QUALITY AND FASTER WRITING. USING A DATA BASE CORRESPONDING TO A SIMPLE 3-D SURFACE, THECOMPUTER-DRIVEN HDI WILL BE USED TO CREATE HARD COPY 3-D IMAGES OF THE SURFACE. THIS EFFORT WILL DEFINE THOSE PARAMETERS THAT CONTRIBUTE TO BRIGHT, LOW NOISE HOLOGRAPHIC IMAGES. THE SLM SHOULD PRODUCE DISPLAYS WITH RESOLUTIONS OF 10 MILLION VOXELS OR MORE. IN PHASES II AND III, THE 3-D DISPLAYS AT THIS RESOLUTION WILL BE PRODUCED IN COLOR. THE INTERFACE BETWEEN EMISSION-COMPUTED TOMOGRAPHY SYSTEMS AND THE HDI WILL BE DEVELOPED AS WILL THE CRITICAL INTERFACE WITH THE USER.