The Spectral X-ray Imaging Data Acquisition (SpeXIDAQ) Framework

Abstract

Photon counting X-ray imagers have found their way into the mainstream scientific community in recent years, and have become important components in many scientific setups. These camera systems are in active development, with output data rates increasing significantly with every new generation of devices. A different class of PCD (Photon Counting Detector) devices has become generally available, where camera data output is no longer a matrix of photon counts but instead direct measurements of the deposited charge per pixel in every frame, which requires significant off-camera processing. This type of PCD, called a hyperspectral X-ray camera due to its fully spectroscopic output, yet again increases the demands put on the acquisition and processing backend. Not only are bandwidth requirements increased, but the need to do extensive data processing is also introduced with these hyperspectral PCD devices. To cope with these new developments the Spectral X-ray Imaging Data Acquisition framework (SpeXIDAQ) has been developed. All aspects of the imaging pipeline are handled by the SpeXIDAQ framework: from detector control and frame grabbing, to processing, storage and live visualisation during experiments.

3D Correlative Imaging of Lithium Ion Concentration in a Vertically Oriented Electrode Microstructure with a Density Gradient

“…The raw data were converted into a spectrum per pixel by software. [ 105 ] Charge sharing events that spanned more than 2 ing pixels were excluded from the spectral reconstructions. The HEXITEC detector collects X‐ray spectra up to 180 keV at room temperature.…”

“…[ 56 ] The average energy resolution (FWHM) of a pixel was measured to be 0.79 ± 0.15 keV using the 59.54 keV line from an Am‐241 sealed source. [ 105 ] The temperature of the CdZnTe detector was maintained at 18 °C with a bias voltage of −1200 V applied. It was focused on analyzing the peak at 93.9 keV of the XCS energy spectra through peak fitting using the Lorentz Gaussian function.…”

“…Given the pinhole geometry, each pixel in the image corresponded to 0.27 × 0.27 mm 2 at the sample. The detector was read out using the SpecXiDAQ software, [ 105 ] operating at a continuous frame rate of 9 kHz with the energy and position of every individual X‐ray photon output as raw data. The recording of the data from the camera began when the data acquisition software received a trigger, [ 105 ] taking ≈ 12 min per region and 36 min in total to complete.…”

X-ray Ptychography with a Laboratory Source

“…The in-house developed software SpeXiDAQ [28] was used for camera control and readout as well as raw data processing. The energy resolution of the SLcam is approximately 144 eV FWHM at the Mn K-alpha peak and the centre of mass accuracy is better than 10 eV [29].…”

“…Due to this processing method, charge sharing effects do not deteriorate the spectral response and sub-pixel accuracy can be achieved [30]. Using SpeXiDAQ [28], the raw frames are stored and afterward processed and split by time or energy into different datasets. The time-based splitting was used for assessing the spatial resolution (see post-processing section below), the energy-based splitting for investigating the spectral properties.…”