CN116224411A

CN116224411A - Method, device, equipment and storage medium for processing scintillation pulse

Info

Publication number: CN116224411A
Application number: CN202211739488.0A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 胡云; 房磊; 杨玲莉; 陈维操; 黄文略
Original assignee: Hefei Ruishi Digital Technology Co ltd
Current assignee: Hefei Ruishi Digital Technology Co ltd
Priority date: 2022-12-30
Filing date: 2022-12-30
Publication date: 2023-06-06

Abstract

The application discloses a method, a device, equipment and a storage medium for processing scintillation pulses. The processing method comprises the following steps: the processing method comprises the following steps: performing multi-threshold sampling on the scintillation pulse to obtain sampling data; based on time reference data, performing reference transformation on the first sampling time of the scintillation pulse which passes through the sampling threshold for the first time, and acquiring target time; data compression is carried out on the target time, and target compression time is obtained; transmitting the sampled data and the target compression time to an external device, so that the external device can determine energy information and/or time information of the scintillation pulse based on the sampled data and the target compression time. The method and the device can process the original sampling data to realize data compression and then transmit the data, can reduce the load of a data transmission network and reduce the consumption of computing resources of a server.

Description

Method, device, equipment and storage medium for processing scintillation pulse

Technical Field

The present invention relates to the field of data processing, and in particular, to a method, apparatus, device, and storage medium for processing scintillation pulses.

Background

In Positron Emission Tomography (PET) applications, gamma rays are converted by a scintillation crystal into a visible light signal, which is further converted by a photoelectric conversion device into a scintillation pulse signal, which is then sampled and processed to obtain a series of application images or energy spectrum information. Among these, sampling of scintillation pulses and processing of sampled data are two very critical processes. High quality sampling can provide accurate raw data for subsequent processing, while fast, efficient and stable processing is a guarantee of excellent presentation of the final results.

Currently, after sampling the scintillation pulse, the sampled data is packaged and sent from the detection device to a processing device, such as a server, via a network. The server processes the received sampled data to obtain relevant energy information. But in general the amount of sampled data is very large. For example, during a PET scan, the detection device continuously detects a large number of scintillation pulses and outputs sampled data. Despite the compression method adopted in the data transmission process, a large amount of bandwidth is still required for data transmission. The server also needs to consume a large amount of computing resources for output processing after receiving the sampled data. This inevitably increases the load of the network transmission, affecting the computing power of the server processor.

Disclosure of Invention

The technical problem to be solved by the embodiments of the present application is how to reduce the network transmission load of data transmission in the pulse sampling process and reduce the computing resource consumption of the server.

In order to solve the problems, the application discloses a method, a device, equipment and a storage medium for processing scintillation pulses.

According to a first aspect of the present application, a method of processing scintillation pulses is provided. The processing method comprises the following steps: performing multi-threshold sampling on the scintillation pulse to obtain sampling data; based on time reference data, performing reference transformation on the first sampling time of the scintillation pulse which passes through the sampling threshold for the first time, and acquiring target time; data compression is carried out on the target time, and target compression time is obtained; transmitting the sampled data and the target compression time to an external device, so that the external device can determine energy information and/or time information of the scintillation pulse based on the sampled data and the target compression time.

According to some embodiments of the present application, when performing multi-threshold sampling, the acquiring sampled data includes: presetting a plurality of thresholds; for each threshold, comparing the scintillation pulse with the threshold, determining a state change signal when the scintillation pulse crosses the threshold; performing digital time sampling on the state change signal to obtain a corresponding threshold-time pair; a plurality of threshold-time pairs are specified to form the sample data.

According to some embodiments of the application, the intervals between the plurality of thresholds are equal.

According to some embodiments of the present application, the scintillation pulse is one of a plurality of scintillation pulses arranged in sequence based on a first sampling time that first crosses a sampling threshold, the time reference data including a first trigger time corresponding to a first time event; the obtaining the target time includes: designating a first time difference between the first sampling time and the first trigger time as the target time.

According to some embodiments of the present application, the target time includes a first time component and a second time component, and the data compressing the target time includes data compressing the first time component, including: acquiring a previous first time component of a previous target time corresponding to a previous scintillation pulse in sequence; designating a second time difference between the first time component and the preceding first time component as a compressed first time component; wherein the number of bytes used to accommodate the compressed first time component is less than the number of bytes used to accommodate the first time component.

According to some embodiments of the present application, the target time includes a first time component and a second time component, and the data compressing the target time includes data compressing the first time component, including: determining a size between a time bit width of the first temporal composition corresponding to a predetermined byte length or an integer multiple of the time bit width; if the first time component is smaller than the time bit width, accommodating the first time component by utilizing the predetermined byte length; if the first time composition is greater than the time bit width or an integer multiple of the time bit width, determining a third time difference between the first time composition and the time bit width or the integer multiple of the time bit width as a compressed first time composition, and accommodating the compressed first time composition by using the predetermined byte length.

According to some embodiments of the present application, the target time includes a first time component and a second time component, and the data compressing the target time includes data compressing the first time component, including: determining a difference in bytes of the first temporal composition corresponding to a previous first temporal composition that corresponds in ordering to a previous target time of a previous scintillation pulse; based on the difference, data compression is performed on the first temporal composition.

According to some embodiments of the present application, the bytes are represented in a plurality of byte numbers arranged in sequence; the determining the difference comprises: sequentially comparing whether the first time composition is the same as the byte number corresponding to the previous first time composition; if the byte numbers are the same, removing the byte numbers which are sequenced in front and correspond to the first time component; if the current byte number and the subsequent byte number are different, stopping comparing and reserving the current byte number and the subsequent byte number corresponding to the first time component, and taking the current byte number and the subsequent byte number as the difference.

According to some embodiments of the present application, based on the difference, data compressing the first temporal composition includes: the difference is specified to represent a first temporal composition after compression.

According to a second aspect of the present application, a method of processing scintillation pulses is provided. The processing method comprises the following steps: acquiring sampling data of scintillation pulses; acquiring a target compression time corresponding to a first sampling time when the scintillation pulse first crosses a sampling threshold; determining whether the scintillation pulse corresponds to a real single event based on the sampling data; if yes, determining target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse based on the target compression time, and determining time information of the real single event based on the target time.

According to some embodiments of the application, the determining whether the scintillation pulse corresponds to a true single event based on the sampling data comprises: determining an objective function corresponding to the scintillation pulse based on the sampling data; integrating the objective function to determine an energy value of the scintillation pulse; determining whether the energy value is within a preset energy range; if yes, determining that the scintillation pulse corresponds to a real single event.

According to some embodiments of the present application, the scintillation pulse is one of a plurality of scintillation pulses arranged in sequence based on a first sampling time that first crosses a sampling threshold, and the target compression time is obtained after data compression of a target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse; the target time comprises a first time component and a second time component, and the compressed first time component obtained by carrying out data compression on the first time component of the target time is combined with the second time component to form the target compression time.

According to some embodiments of the present application, the determining the target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse based on the target compression time includes: acquiring a previous first time component of a previous target time corresponding to a previous scintillation pulse in sequence; designating the sum of the previous first time composition and the compressed first time composition as the first time composition.

According to some embodiments of the present application, the determining the target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse based on the target compression time includes: acquiring a multiple relation between the first time component and a time bit width corresponding to a preset byte length; and determining the first time composition based on the time bit width, the multiple relation and the compressed first time composition.

According to some embodiments of the present application, the determining the target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse based on the target compression time includes: acquiring a plurality of byte numbers of bytes corresponding to a previous first time component, the previous first time component corresponding in order to a previous target time of a previous scintillation pulse; the first temporal composition is determined based on a number of bytes of the bytes corresponding to the previous first temporal composition and the compressed first temporal composition.

According to some embodiments of the application, the determining the time information of the real single event based on the target time includes: acquiring a plurality of first trigger times corresponding to a plurality of time events; respectively comparing whether the time difference between the target time and the plurality of first trigger times is within a preset time range; if yes, determining the first triggering time as the time information of the real single event corresponding to the scintillation pulse.

According to a third aspect of the present application, a processing device for scintillation pulses is provided. The processing device comprises: the sampling module is configured to perform multi-threshold sampling on the scintillation pulse to obtain sampling data; the conversion module is configured to perform reference conversion on the first sampling time of the scintillation pulse which is included in the sampling data and passes the sampling threshold value for the first time based on the time reference data, so as to obtain target time; the compression module is configured to compress the data of the target time to obtain target compression time; and the transmission module is configured to transmit the sampling data and the target compression time to an external device so that the external device can determine energy information and/or time information of the scintillation pulse based on the sampling data and the target compression time.

According to some embodiments of the present application, to perform multi-threshold sampling to obtain sampled data, the sampling module is configured to: presetting a plurality of thresholds; for each threshold, comparing the scintillation pulse with the threshold, determining a state change signal when the scintillation pulse crosses the threshold; performing digital time sampling on the state change signal to obtain a corresponding threshold-time pair; a plurality of threshold-time pairs are specified to form the sample data.

According to some embodiments of the present application, the scintillation pulse is one of a plurality of scintillation pulses arranged in sequence based on a first sampling time that first crosses a sampling threshold, the time reference data including a first trigger time corresponding to a first time event; to obtain the target time, the conversion module is configured to: designating a first time difference between the first sampling time and the first trigger time as the target time.

According to some embodiments of the present application, the target time includes a first time component and a second time component, the compressing module is configured to: acquiring a previous first time component of a previous target time corresponding to a previous scintillation pulse in sequence; designating a second time difference between the first time component and the preceding first time component as a compressed first time component; wherein the number of bytes used to accommodate the compressed first time component is less than the number of bytes used to accommodate the first time component.

According to some embodiments of the present application, the target time includes a first time component and a second time component, the compressing module is configured to: determining a size between a time bit width of the first temporal composition corresponding to a predetermined byte length or an integer multiple of the time bit width; if the first time component is smaller than the time bit width, accommodating the first time component by utilizing the predetermined byte length; if the first time composition is greater than the time bit width or an integer multiple of the time bit width, determining a third time difference between the first time composition and the time bit width or the integer multiple of the time bit width as a compressed first time composition, and accommodating the compressed first time composition by using the predetermined byte length.

According to some embodiments of the present application, the target time includes a first time component and a second time component, the compressing module is configured to: determining a difference in bytes of the first temporal composition corresponding to a previous first temporal composition that corresponds in ordering to a previous target time of a previous scintillation pulse; based on the difference, data compression is performed on the first temporal composition.

According to some embodiments of the present application, the bytes are represented in a plurality of byte numbers arranged in sequence; to determine the difference, the compression module is configured to: sequentially comparing whether the first time composition is the same as the byte number corresponding to the previous first time composition; if the byte numbers are the same, removing the byte numbers which are sequenced in front and correspond to the first time component; if the current byte number and the subsequent byte number are different, stopping comparing and reserving the current byte number and the subsequent byte number corresponding to the first time component, and taking the current byte number and the subsequent byte number as the difference.

According to some embodiments of the application, to compress the data for the first temporal composition based on the difference, the compression module is configured to: the difference is specified to represent a first temporal composition after compression.

According to a fourth aspect of the present application, there is provided a processing device for scintillation pulses. The processing device comprises: the first acquisition module is configured to acquire sampling data of the scintillation pulse; a second acquisition module configured to acquire a target compression time corresponding to a first sampling time at which the scintillation pulse first crosses a sampling threshold; a decision module configured to determine whether the scintillation pulse corresponds to a real single event based on the sampling data; and the determining module is configured to determine a target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse based on the target compression time when the scintillation pulse corresponds to a real single event, and determine time information of the real single event based on the target time.

According to some embodiments of the application, to determine whether the scintillation pulse corresponds to a true single event based on the sampling data, the decision module is configured to: determining an objective function corresponding to the scintillation pulse based on the sampling data; integrating the objective function to determine an energy value of the scintillation pulse; determining whether the energy value is within a preset energy range; if yes, determining that the scintillation pulse corresponds to a real single event.

According to some embodiments of the present application, to determine a target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse based on the target compression time, the determination module is configured to: acquiring a previous first time component of a previous target time corresponding to a previous scintillation pulse in sequence; designating the sum of the previous first time composition and the compressed first time composition as the first time composition.

According to some embodiments of the present application, to determine a target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse based on the target compression time, the determination module is configured to: acquiring a multiple relation between the first time component and a time bit width corresponding to a preset byte length; and determining the first time composition based on the time bit width, the multiple relation and the compressed first time composition.

According to some embodiments of the present application, to determine a target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse based on the target compression time, the determination module is configured to: acquiring a plurality of byte numbers of bytes corresponding to a previous first time component, the previous first time component corresponding in order to a previous target time of a previous scintillation pulse; the first temporal composition is determined based on a number of bytes of the bytes corresponding to the previous first temporal composition and the compressed first temporal composition.

According to some embodiments of the application, to determine the time information of the real single event based on the target time, the determining module is configured to: acquiring a plurality of first trigger times corresponding to a plurality of time events; respectively comparing whether the time difference between the target time and the plurality of first trigger times is within a preset time range; if yes, determining the first triggering time as the time information of the real single event corresponding to the scintillation pulse.

According to a fifth aspect of the present application, a processing apparatus is provided. The processing device comprises a memory, a processor and a computer program stored on the memory and executable on the processor, which when executed by the processor, implements the steps of the method as described above.

According to a sixth aspect of the present application, a computer readable storage medium is provided. The storage medium has stored thereon a computer program which, when executed by a processor, implements the steps of the method as described above.

The processing method of the scintillation pulse disclosed by the application can process the original sampling data to realize the compression of the data size and then transmit the data size, can reduce the network transmission load of data transmission and lighten the calculation resource consumption of a server.

Drawings

The present application will be further illustrated by way of example embodiments, which will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings. The embodiments are not limiting, in which like numerals represent like structures, wherein:

FIG. 1 is an exemplary flow chart of a method of processing scintillation pulses shown in accordance with some embodiments of the present application;

FIG. 2 is an exemplary flow chart of another method of processing scintillation pulses shown in accordance with some embodiments of the present application;

FIG. 3 is an exemplary schematic diagram of pulse waveforms of scintillation pulses shown in accordance with some embodiments of the present application;

FIG. 4 is an exemplary schematic diagram of sampling of scintillation pulses shown in accordance with some embodiments of the present application;

FIG. 5 is an exemplary block diagram of a data processing system for scintillation pulse processing shown in accordance with some embodiments of the present application;

FIG. 6 is an exemplary block diagram of another data processing system for scintillation pulse sampling shown in accordance with some embodiments of the present application;

FIG. 7 is an exemplary functional block diagram of a data processing system for scintillation pulse processing shown in accordance with some embodiments of the present application.

Detailed Description

In order to make the above objects, features and advantages of the present application more comprehensible, embodiments accompanied with figures are described in detail below. In the following description, numerous specific details are set forth in order to provide a thorough understanding of the present application. This application is, however, susceptible of embodiment in many other forms than those described herein and similar modifications can be made by those skilled in the art without departing from the spirit of the application, and therefore the application is not to be limited to the specific embodiments disclosed below.

It will be understood that when an element is referred to as being "mounted" to another element, it can be directly mounted to the other element or intervening elements may also be present. When an element is referred to as being "connected" to another element, it can be directly connected to the other element or intervening elements may also be present. The terms "vertical," "horizontal," "left," "right," and the like are used herein for illustrative purposes only.

Unless defined otherwise, all technical and scientific terms used herein have the same meaning as commonly understood by one of ordinary skill in the art to which this application belongs. The terminology used herein in the description of the application is for the purpose of describing particular embodiments only and is not intended to be limiting of the application. The term "and/or" and/or "as used herein includes any and all combinations of one or more of the associated listed items.

Some preferred embodiments of the present application are described below with reference to the accompanying drawings. It should be noted that the following description is for illustrative purposes and is not intended to limit the scope of the present application.

Fig. 1 is an exemplary flow chart of a method of processing scintillation pulses shown in accordance with some embodiments of the present application. In some embodiments, the method 100 of processing scintillation pulses may be performed by the first data processing system 600. For example, the method 100 of processing a scintillation pulse may be stored in a storage device (e.g., a self-contained memory unit or an external memory device of the first data processing system 600) in the form of a program or instructions that, when executed, implement the method 100 of processing a scintillation pulse. As shown in fig. 1, the method 100 of processing scintillation pulses may include the following steps.

Step 110, performing multi-threshold sampling on the scintillation pulse to obtain sampling data.

In some embodiments, the scintillation pulse may be acquired by a radiation detection device. The radiation detection device may include a semiconductor detector, such as a P-N junction semiconductor detector, a lithium drift semiconductor detector, a high purity germanium semiconductor detector, a germanium lithium semiconductor detector, a silicon microstrip semiconductor detector, a metal surface barrier semiconductor detector, or the like. The radiation detection device may further comprise a scintillation detector. The scintillation detector may include scintillation crystals coupled to each other and a photoelectric conversion device. Scintillation crystals (e.g. BGO, PWO, LYSO: ce, GAGG: ce, naI: TI, csI: TI, laBr3: ce, baF) ₂ Etc.) for converting detected high-energy rays (such as gamma rays, neutron rays, etc.) into visible light signals, and a photoelectric conversion device (e.g., photomultiplier tube PMT, silicon photomultiplier SiPM, etc.) for converting the visible light signals into electrical signals that are output in the form of scintillation pulses through electronics coupled to the photoelectric conversion device. Referring to fig. 3, fig. 3 is an exemplary schematic diagram of pulse waveforms of scintillation pulses shown in accordance with some embodiments of the present application. As shown in fig. 3, the shape of the pulse waveform of the scintillation pulse 300 conforms to the symmetrical bell shape described by the gaussian function. Comprising rising edges with increasing pulse amplitude over time, and with time after reaching peak The falling edge of the pulse amplitude is shifted to be continuously reduced.

An exemplary multi-threshold sampling may be a preset plurality of sampling thresholds, by which the time when the scintillation pulse crosses a sampling threshold is obtained by comparing with the scintillation pulse, and a threshold-time pair is formed with the corresponding sampling threshold to form the sampling data. Fig. 4 illustrates an exemplary schematic diagram of sampling of scintillation pulses shown in accordance with some embodiments of the present application. For ease of illustration, two thresholds are used for example description. The working device for multi-threshold sampling may include a comparator and a digitizer. The comparator may be configured to perform a comparison between the scintillation pulse and the sampling threshold, and to output a state change signal at a time when the scintillation pulse crosses the sampling threshold. The time-to-digital converter can be used for performing digital time sampling and digital sampling on the state change signal output by the comparator, and acquiring the time when the scintillation pulse crosses the sampling threshold value. The resulting threshold-time pairs constitute the sampled data. As shown in fig. 4, the amplitude of the scintillation pulse is gradually increased over time. At this time, the comparator can compare the scintillation pulse with the sampling threshold A ₁ . When the scintillation pulse crosses the sampling threshold A from bottom to top ₁ The comparator may generate a state change signal. The time-to-digital converter can digitally sample the state change information to obtain corresponding jump time t ₁ . Subsequently, the amplitude of the scintillation pulse continues to increase. The comparator can compare the scintillation pulse with the sampling threshold A ₂ . When the scintillation pulse crosses the sampling threshold A from bottom to top ₂ When the comparator may generate another state change signal. The time-to-digital converter can digitally sample the state change information to obtain corresponding jump time t ₂ . The scintillation pulse will gradually decrease over time after reaching its peak. At this time, the comparator can continue to compare the scintillation pulse with the sampling threshold A ₂ . When the scintillation pulse crosses the sampling threshold A from top to bottom ₂ The comparator may generate a state change signal. The time-to-digital converter can digitally sample the state change information to obtain corresponding jump time t ₃ . If the amplitude of the scintillation pulse continues to decrease, the comparator will cross the sampling threshold A from top to bottom in the scintillation pulse ₁ A state change message is generated. The time-to-digital converter can digitally sample the state change information to obtain corresponding jump time t ₄ . At this point the whole sampling procedure is completed. In multi-threshold sampling, one sampling threshold may correspond to two threshold-time pairs. When the set number of sampling threshold values is n, sampling data containing 2n threshold-time pairs is obtained.

In some embodiments, the working device implementing the sampling process of the scintillation pulse may also include a scintillation pulse acquisition circuit board. The comparator and time-to-digital converter mentioned in the foregoing may be integrated in the scintillation pulse acquisition circuit board. The scintillation pulse acquisition circuit board may also include other components. For example, a Digital-to-time Converter (DAC) for setting a threshold, a chip for providing logic resources for a time-to-Digital Converter (e.g., an FPGA chip, which may be implemented with a carry chain inside the FPGA), and so on. Thus, the scintillation pulse acquisition circuit board may also be referred to as a chip board. These elements can be electrically connected on the scintillation pulse acquisition circuit board to realize data transmission.

It should be understood that in actual sampling, the pulse waveform is not smoothed as shown in fig. 4, but rather has more fluctuation, and actually appears as fluctuation rising or fluctuation falling within the range of the waveform shown in fig. 4. The smooth waveform shown in fig. 4 is for ease of illustration. Therefore, during actual sampling, the waveform may cross the same threshold multiple times in a very short time, and the average time of crossing the threshold multiple times in a certain time window or period may be taken as the time of crossing the threshold during actual sampling, which belongs to the technical field, and is easily implemented by those skilled in the art according to the teachings of the present application, and is not described herein.

In some embodiments, the intervals between the plurality of sampling thresholds may be equal. That is, the plurality of sampling thresholds may constitute an arithmetic progression. Taking the voltage threshold as an example, the spacing between the plurality of sampling thresholds may be 10mV, 20mV, 30mV, etc. The intervals between the plurality of sampling thresholds may also be unequal. For example, the plurality of sampling thresholds may form an equipotential array with a common ratio of 2.

In some embodiments, the plurality of sampling thresholds may be determined based on empirical data and/or a priori information of the scintillation pulse. For example, taking the electrical pulse as an example, summary data for a large number of electrical pulses shows that the peak value of the associated noise is typically below 60mV. Then the lowest sampling threshold of the plurality of sampling thresholds may be set to 60mV. For another example, the a priori information of the scintillation pulse may yield the magnitude of the pulse peak. At this time, a plurality of sampling thresholds within the peak of the scintillation pulse may be set such that each sampling threshold is capable of acquiring the relevant data. Of course, the plurality of sampling thresholds may not all be within the peak of the scintillation pulse. For example, a certain number of sampling thresholds may be set, based on the calculation of the threshold data actually traversed by the scintillation pulse during the comparison. Taking the voltage threshold as an example, assume that 8 sampling thresholds are set at 60mV, 80mV,100mV,120mV,140mV,160mV,180mV,200mV, respectively. If the peak value of the scintillation pulse is high (e.g., 220 mV), the scintillation pulse may cross more sampling thresholds, such as all 8 thresholds. If the peak value of the scintillation pulse is low (e.g., 150 mV), the scintillation pulse may cross fewer sampling thresholds, such as the first 5 thresholds.

And 120, performing reference transformation on the first sampling time of the scintillation pulse which is included in the sampling data and passes the sampling threshold value for the first time based on the time reference data, and acquiring target time.

In some embodiments, the scintillation pulse can be one of a plurality of scintillation pulses arranged in a sequence. For example, the radiation detection device may continuously detect the high energy radiation and output scintillation pulses. One scintillation pulse may correspond to one energy event and one time event. The energy event may refer to the energy value carried by the scintillation pulse, and the time event may refer to the arrival time of the scintillation pulse, which may also be understood as the time at which the high energy rays/particles producing the scintillation pulse were captured by the radiation detection device. The scintillation pulses may be ordered according to a first sampling time that first crosses a minimum sampling threshold, the first sampling time being earlier ordered. These scintillation pulses may also be ordered according to arrival times, with earlier arrival times ordered. The processing object of the processing method, that is, the scintillation pulse to be processed, may be any one of these scintillation pulses.

In some embodiments, the scintillation pulse may be energy-summed. It will be appreciated that Compton scattering may occur after the energetic rays/particles enter one of the crystal passages of the radiation detection device (i.e. after being incident into the crystal). The energy of the gamma photon changes, the direction shifts, and energy deposits are generated on a plurality of crystal paths, so that a plurality of pulse signals are output. In order to accurately restore the energy of the incident high-energy rays/particles, these pulse signals may be energy-summed, thereby making the subsequent energy calculations more accurate. Meanwhile, since scattering events may occur, in order to determine the captured time of the incident high-energy rays/particles (i.e., the arrival time described above), two trigger thresholds may be preset for comparison with the amplitudes of the plurality of pulse signals to determine the point in time at which the amplitudes of the pulse signals cross the trigger thresholds. In the two trigger thresholds, the lower trigger threshold can be larger than the maximum amplitude of the noise signal, so that the noise signal can be effectively filtered, and false detection of the noise signal is effectively avoided. When the pulse signal crosses a higher trigger threshold, the pulse signal may be determined to be a valid pulse signal. The time at which the earliest first crossing of the lower trigger threshold in all valid pulse signals may be taken as the arrival time. Alternatively, the time when the lower trigger threshold is crossed can be regarded as the arrival time, among all the effective pulse signals, the effective pulse signal having the largest time difference between the first crossing of the lower trigger threshold and the second crossing of the higher trigger threshold.

In order to match the energy event corresponding to the scintillation pulse with the time event, the time data corresponding to the energy event can be correlated withThe time data corresponding to the time event is placed at the same timing starting point. For example, the first sample time at which the scintillation pulse first crosses the lowest sample threshold in the sample data may be differenced from the time reference data. The time reference data may be a first trigger time corresponding to a first time event among a plurality of time events corresponding to the plurality of scintillation pulses. The trigger time may be the arrival time described above. That is, the first trigger time may be the minimum of all arrival times. The first time difference between the first sampling time and the first triggering time can be used as a target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse after reference conversion. Assuming that the first sampling time is noted as T ₀ The first trigger time is recorded as t ₀ Then the target time T ₀ ′＝T ₀ -t ₀ . The target time may be used for matching between the energy event corresponding to the subsequent scintillation pulse and the time event.

And 130, performing data compression on the target time to obtain target compression time.

In some embodiments, the target time may include a first time component (also referred to herein as a coarse time) and a second time component (also referred to herein as a fine time). It is understood that the representation of time may be performed in common by one or more units of time. For example, 5ms37 μs. The first temporal composition may be the first 5ms and the second temporal composition may be the second 37 mus. In some embodiments, 6 bytes may be used to accommodate the target time. Wherein 5 bytes are used to accommodate the first temporal composition and 1 byte may be used to accommodate the second temporal composition. In this step, for the data compression of the target time, the first time component may be data-compressed to accommodate the compressed first time component using fewer bytes. The compressed first time combination and second time combination together form the target compression time.

In some embodiments, to achieve data compression for the first temporal composition, the preceding target times corresponding to the preceding scintillation pulses are orderedThe previous first time composition may be obtained. As an example, assume that the scintillation pulse to be processed is the ith in the order, the corresponding target time is

The first time composition is marked as T _i . The previous scintillation pulse is the i-1 th scintillation pulse in the sequence, the corresponding target time is +.>

Its first time composition is marked as T _i-1 . Then a second time difference DeltaT between the first time component and the previous first time component _i ＝T _i -T _i-1 May be formed as the first time after compression. For example, after data compression of 10 sequentially arranged scintillation pulses, corresponding first time components of the target time, the compressed first time components are respectively: delta T ₁ ＝T ₁ ,ΔT ₂ ＝T ₂ -T ₁ ,ΔT ₃ ＝T ₃ -T ₂ ,…,ΔT ₁₀ ＝T ₁₀ -T ₉ . Depending on the frequency at which the radiation detection device captures the high energy rays/particles to generate scintillation pulses, the interval between two scintillation pulses may not exceed 5ms. Thus, the first time component after compression can be accommodated using 3 bytes less than 5 bytes. It is known that the time bit width corresponding to one bit may be 5ns, and then the time bit width corresponding to 3 bytes is 0xffffff×5= 83886075 ns=83 ms. May be used to accommodate the compressed first time profile. The time bit width corresponding to 2 bytes is smaller than 5ms, the time bit width corresponding to 4 bytes is 21s, and the time bit width is far greater than 5ms, so that waste is caused. It should be noted that the first time component corresponding to the first scintillation pulse in the sequence is not processed. When the target time of the scintillation pulse is acquired, the first time difference between the first sampling time of the first scintillation pulse and the first trigger time corresponding to the first time event is slightly greater than 0 (based on prior information and/or prior data). Likewise, the time-bit-width corresponding to 3 bytes can be used to accommodate the first corresponding to the first scintillation pulse Time composition. Based on this, after data compression, the number of bytes to accommodate the first time component is changed from 5 to 3, reducing the data size. This compression mode may also be referred to as a first compression mode.

In some embodiments, to enable data compression of the first temporal composition, a size between a temporal bit width of the first temporal composition corresponding to a predetermined byte length or an integer multiple of the temporal bit width may be determined. The predetermined byte length may be 3 bytes. The time bit width corresponding to 3 bytes may be 83ms. The integer multiple of the time bit width corresponding to 3 bytes may be n×83ms, n≡2. If the first time component is less than the time bit width, the first time component may be accommodated with the predetermined byte length. That is, if the first time component is less than 83ms, 3 bytes may be utilized to accommodate the first time component. If the first time composition is greater than the time bit width or an integer multiple of the time bit width, a third time difference between the first time composition and the time bit width or an integer multiple of the time bit width may be determined. For example, assuming the first time component is 90ms, the third time difference may be 90ms-83 ms=7 ms. For another example, assuming the first time composition is 170ms, the third time difference may be 170ms-2 x 83ms = 4ms. The third time difference may be designated as a compressed first time component, which may be accommodated with the predetermined byte length. That is, 3 bytes are used to accommodate the first time composition after compression. Based on this, after data compression, the number of bytes to accommodate the first time component is also changed from 5 to 3, reducing the data size. This compression mode may also be referred to as a second compression mode.

In some embodiments, to enable data compression of the first temporal composition, a difference in bytes of the first temporal composition corresponding to a previous first temporal composition that corresponds in ordering to a previous target time of a previous scintillation pulse may be determined. It will be appreciated that bytes may be represented by a number of bytes in a sequential order. For example, the number of bytes for accommodating the 5 bytes of the first temporal composition may be represented as 0xaa, bb,12, 34, 56 in turn. The first difference may be determined by sequentially comparing whether the first temporal composition and the preceding first temporal composition correspond to the same number of bytes. If so, the number of bytes in the first time component corresponding to the first time component and sequenced in the front can be removed. If the first time component is different, the comparison can be stopped, and the current byte number and the subsequent byte number corresponding to the first time component can be reserved as the difference. Illustratively, assume that the previous first time component corresponds to a number of bytes of 0xaa, bb,12, 34, 56, and that the first time component corresponds to a number of bytes of 0xaa, bb,10, 78, 89. The first two bytes corresponding to the first time component are the same as the bytes corresponding to the preceding first time component and can be discarded. The third number of bytes is different, at which time the comparison may stop, while the third and subsequent numbers of bytes, 10, 78, 89, may be designated as the difference. The difference may be designated as a first temporal composition after compression. Based on this, the number of bytes to accommodate the bytes of the first time composition is changed from 5 to 1-5, reducing the data size. This compression mode may also be referred to as a third compression mode.

And 140, transmitting the sampling data and the target compression time to an external device so that the external device can determine the energy information and the time information of the scintillation pulse based on the sampling data and the target compression time.

It will be appreciated that the processing of a closed loop scintillation pulse may include pulse acquisition, sampling, and data processing. The front end component comprises a radiation detection device, pulse acquisition can be achieved, the scintillation pulse acquisition board can achieve pulse sampling, and the back end component comprises processing equipment such as a computer, a server and the like, and can achieve data processing. While the front-end component may transmit sampled data to the back-end component, a large amount of data during transmission would result in a very heavy network load. And the back-end component computer or server also consumes significant computing resources to process upon receiving a large amount of data. In step 140, the sampled data for the scintillation pulse is processed for transmission. That is, the transmission may be a target compression time obtained after compression. In this way, the amount of data transferred will be reduced, and the network load can be reduced. And an external device such as a computer, a server and the like can recover the pulse waveform of the scintillation pulse based on the received sampling data, so as to determine the energy value of the scintillation pulse as corresponding energy information. The energy values may be used for image reconstruction (e.g., PET image reconstruction). And simultaneously, the target compression time can be recovered to be the target time of the scintillation pulse, and the target compression time is compared with the first trigger time of all the time events acquired simultaneously to determine the time information of the time event corresponding to the scintillation pulse.

In some embodiments, the processing method 100 may be performed by a chip board. Such as the scintillation pulse acquisition plate described previously. The chip on the chip board may comprise PLD, CPLD, FPGA or ASIC chips. The chip board can sample the scintillation pulse, and utilize the limited computing resource of self to carry out partial processing to the sampling data, reduce the size that the sampling data occupy. This process may be considered another form of "data compression".

The transmitted data is described below in one example.

Assuming 8 sampling thresholds are set, 16 threshold-time pairs (i.e., sampling data) can be acquired to determine the energy value of the scintillation pulse. That is, 16 time data are required to determine the energy value of one scintillation pulse. And 1 part of time data has a size of 6 bytes (wherein 5 bytes are coarse time and 1 byte is fine time). The size of 16 parts of time data is 96 bytes in total. At the same time, the total data size may exceed 96 bytes, along with other information that needs to be transmitted with the time data, such as event type (i.e., time event) and channel information identification (i.e., which detection channel of the scintillation pulse detector received the high energy particle generated the scintillation pulse). By T ₀ -T ₁₅ Representing the 16 pieces of time data, the 16 pieces of time data may be reduced in size by at least 4 bytes through the processing of the foregoing steps of the processing method 100. Illustratively, event type, channel information identification will not be processed. Target time T ₀ Will be compressed to T ₀ '. Wherein the coarse time is compressed and the fine time is not compressed, taking up a total of 2-5 bytes. The next 15 sample times are not processed and still occupy 6 bytes, respectively.

When the first compression method or the second compression method is used (the first time component of the target time is compressed from 5 bytes to 3 bytes), the package format of all data to be transmitted can be as follows:

where EF is used to distinguish event types, CC represents the number of channels, taking up a total of 2 bytes. T (T) ₀ ' occupy 4 bytes. The number of bytes for storing the time information is reduced from 96 to 94.

By the first compression mode or the second compression mode, the sampling data of one scintillation pulse sampling is reduced by 2 bytes, and the data volume is reduced. The transmitted data volume is reduced, the network transmission load can be reduced, and the transmission efficiency is improved. In another aspect, the computing resource consumption of the server is reduced, and the data processing speed is improved.

When the third compression mode is used (the first time component of the target time is compressed from 5 bytes to 1-5 bytes which are dynamic), the encapsulation format of all data to be transmitted can be as follows:

when compressed to 1 byte:

when the compression is to be 2 bytes,

when the compression is to be 3 bytes,

when the compression is to be 4 bytes,

when the third compression scheme is used, 5 bytes are reserved:

by the third compression mode, the sampling data of one scintillation pulse sampling can be dynamically reduced by 1-4 bytes, and the data volume is reduced. The transmitted data volume is reduced, the network transmission load can be reduced, and the transmission efficiency is improved. In another aspect, the computing resource consumption of the server is reduced, and the data processing speed is improved.

It should be noted that the descriptions of the steps in fig. 1 above are only for illustration and description, and do not limit the application scope of the present specification. Various modifications and changes to the steps of fig. 1 may be made by those skilled in the art under the guidance of this specification. However, such modifications and variations are still within the scope of the present description.

Fig. 2 is an exemplary flow chart of another method of processing scintillation pulses according to some embodiments of the present application in which the method 200 of processing scintillation pulses may be performed by a second data processing system 700. For example, the method 200 of processing a scintillation pulse may be stored in a storage device (e.g., a self-contained memory unit or an external memory device of the second data processing system 700) in the form of a program or instructions that, when executed, implement the method 200 of processing a scintillation pulse. As shown in fig. 2, the method 200 of processing scintillation pulses may include the following steps.

At step 210, sampling data of the scintillation pulse is acquired.

Step 220, a target compression time corresponding to a first sampling time at which the scintillation pulse first crosses the sampling threshold is obtained.

In some embodiments, the sample data and the target compression time may be the same as or similar to those in the processing method 100, and reference may be made to the processing method 100. In some embodiments, the first processing system 600 for performing the processing method 100 may transmit the information described above to the second processing system 700. The information is compressed, and the network transmission load of data transmission can be reduced during transmission. The scintillation pulse may be one of a plurality of scintillation pulses arranged in a sequence, as such or similar. The processing method 200 may obtain relevant information corresponding to each scintillation pulse.

Step 230, determining whether the scintillation pulse corresponds to a real single event based on the sampling data.

In some embodiments, the sampled data may be used to determine an objective function that characterizes the shape of the pulse waveform of the scintillation pulse. For example, referring to the description in the processing method 100, the gaussian function model may be an objective function that is not determined as a parameter. Based on the sampled data, a function fitting may be performed, for example, by a fitting method such as a least squares method, to determine parameters of the objective function. Illustratively, assume a gaussian function model as a parametric undetermined objective function, expressed as:

where y represents the amplitude of the scintillation pulse, x represents the time corresponding to the amplitude of the scintillation pulse, a represents the maximum amplitude of the scintillation pulse (i.e., the peak value of the scintillation pulse), b represents the symmetry axis of the scintillation pulse (in terms of time), c represents the standard deviation (i.e., the gaussian RMS width value)

Multiple times. And fitting the parameters a and c by using a least square method and other fitting methods to determine the optimal value of the parameters. After the fitting is completed, the Gaussian function model with the determined parameters can be used as the target function.

It will be appreciated that in pulse detection, it is necessary to distinguish between scintillation pulses generated by the radiation detection device to determine scintillation pulses corresponding to a true single event. In PET detection, the energy of a pair of gamma photons produced by annihilation is approximately 511keV. By comparing the energy value of the scintillation pulse with 511keV or within an error range, or determining whether the energy value of the scintillation pulse is within a preset energy range containing 511keV, it can be determined whether the scintillation pulse corresponds to a real single event. For example, it may be determined whether the energy of the scintillation pulse is within 431-1000 keV. If yes, the scintillation pulse can be determined to correspond to a real single event. The energy value of the scintillation pulse can be obtained by integrating the corresponding curve of the objective function model determined by the parameters.

Step 240, determining a target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse based on the target compression time, and determining time information of the real single event based on the target time.

In some embodiments, upon determining that the scintillation pulse corresponds to a true single event, the acquired target compression time may be restored to determine the target time. For example, the compressed first time composition in the target compression time is restored to the first time composition before compression. And combining the second time components to jointly form the recovered target time.

When the target compression time is obtained based on the first compression mode, a previous first time composition and the first time composition may be obtained, and a sum of the previous first time composition and the compressed first time composition may be designated as the first time composition. The preceding first time component corresponds in rank to a preceding target time of a preceding scintillation pulse. For example, assuming that 10 scintillation pulses of related information are acquired, for the first scintillation pulse, the corresponding target time is not compressed, still

The corresponding first time is T ₁ . Sequencing the second scintillation pulse to obtain a corresponding compressed first time composition of DeltaT ₂ Wherein DeltaT ₂ ＝T ₂ -T ₁ . The sum T of the previous first time component and the compressed first time component ₁ +ΔT ₂ First time component T which can be used as target time corresponding to flash pulse of second sequence after recovery ₂ . And so on, ordering the first temporal composition T of the target times corresponding to the third scintillation pulse ₃ ＝T ₂ +ΔT ₃ ＝T ₁ +ΔT ₂ +ΔT ₃ First time component T of target time corresponding to fourth scintillation pulse ₄ ＝T ₃ +ΔT ₄ ＝T ₁ +ΔT ₂ +ΔT ₃ +ΔT ₄ … first temporal composition T of target times corresponding to tenth scintillation pulse ₁₀ ＝T ₉ +ΔT ₁₀ ＝T ₁ +ΔT ₂ +ΔT ₃ +ΔT ₄ +ΔT ₅ +ΔT ₆ +ΔT ₇ +ΔT ₈ +ΔT ₉ +ΔT ₁₀ 。

When the target compression time is obtained based on the second compression mode, a multiple relation between the first time component and a time bit width corresponding to a predetermined byte length can be obtained, and the first time component is determined based on the time bit width, the multiple relation and the compressed first time component. Illustratively, it is assumed that the multiple relationship between the first temporal composition of the target time and the temporal bit width (e.g., 83 ms) corresponding to the predetermined byte length (e.g., 3 bytes) is 0, that is, the first temporal composition of the target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse is less than 83ms. It can be stated that the first time component is not compressed and is directly accommodated with a predetermined byte length. Therefore, the compressed first time composition is directly used as the recovered first time composition without modification. It is assumed that the multiple relationship is 1, that is, the first time composition of the target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse is greater than 83ms and less than 2×83 ms=166 ms. Based on the compression mode, the first time composition Δt after compression is a value obtained by subtracting 83ms. Thus, the first time composition T after recovery is 83ms+Δt. If the multiple relationship is 2, the first time composition T after recovery is 2×83ms+Δt. And so on.

When the target compression time is obtained based on the third compression mode, a plurality of byte numbers of bytes corresponding to a previous first time composition may be obtained, and the first time composition may be determined based on the plurality of byte numbers of bytes corresponding to the previous first time composition and the compressed first time composition. The preceding first time component corresponds in rank to a preceding target time of a preceding scintillation pulse. For example, assuming that information about a plurality of scintillation pulses is obtained, for the scintillation pulse of the first order, the corresponding target time is not compressed (i.e., the first time component after compression is the same as the uncompressed first time component), and the number of bytes of the bytes corresponding to the first time component is AA, BB, CC, DD, EE. And sequencing the second scintillation pulse, wherein the number of the bytes forming the corresponding bytes at the first time after compression is FF and GG. According to the third compression scheme, the first three bits of the plurality of byte numbers that order the corresponding bytes of the first time composition after compression of the second scintillation pulse are the same as the first three bits of the plurality of byte numbers that order the corresponding bytes of the first time composition after compression of the first scintillation pulse. Thus, the first temporal composition of the second scintillation pulse is AA, BB, CC, FF, GG. If the third scintillation pulse is sequenced, the number of bytes of the corresponding bytes of the first time component after compression is JJ, KK, LL, HH. Then, the number of bytes corresponding to the first time component of the compressed flash pulse of the second sequence is the same as the number of bytes of the first bit, and is AA. The corresponding first time component is AA, JJ, KK, LL, HH. And so on.

In some embodiments, after the target time of the scintillation pulse is determined, a comparison may be made with the first trigger times corresponding to all time events. If the difference between the target time and the first trigger time is within a preset time range, for example, 50ns, the first trigger time can be considered as the time information of the real single event corresponding to the scintillation pulse.

It should be noted that the above description of the steps in fig. 2 is only for illustration and description, and does not limit the application scope of the present specification. Various modifications and changes to the individual steps of fig. 2 may be made by those skilled in the art under the guidance of this specification. However, such modifications and variations are still within the scope of the present description.

According to the scintillation pulse processing method disclosed by the application, the energy information and the time information of the scintillation pulse can be calculated based on the compressed sampling data, so that complex function fitting calculation is avoided, the calculation resource consumption is reduced, the calculation time is shortened, and the calculation efficiency is improved.

FIG. 5 is an exemplary block diagram of a data processing system according to some embodiments of the present description. The data processing system can realize sampling data processing of the scintillation pulse. As shown in fig. 5, the first data processing system 500 may include a sampling module 510, a conversion module 520, a compression module 530, and a transmission module 540..

The sampling module 510 may be configured to perform multi-threshold sampling of the scintillation pulse in accordance with step 110 as described above to obtain sampled data. The scintillation pulse may be acquired by a radiation detection device, such as a scintillation detector. The photoelectric conversion device of the scintillation detector may convert the visible light signal into an electrical signal that is output in the form of scintillation pulses through electronics connected to the photoelectric conversion device. When multi-threshold sampling is adopted, a plurality of thresholds can be preset, the preset thresholds are compared with the scintillation pulse to obtain the time when the scintillation pulse passes the threshold, and a threshold-time pair is formed with the corresponding threshold to form the sampling data. The intervals between the plurality of thresholds may be equal and may be determined based on empirical data and/or a priori information of the scintillation pulse.

The conversion module 520 may be configured to perform reference conversion on a first sampling time at which the scintillation pulse included in the sampling data first crosses the sampling threshold value based on the time reference data according to step 120 as described above, to obtain the target time. The scintillation pulse may be one of a plurality of scintillation pulses arranged in a sequence. For example, the ordering is based on the first sample time that first crosses the lowest sample threshold, with the first sample time earlier ordered. In order to match the energy event corresponding to the scintillation pulse with the time event, the conversion module 530 may place the time data corresponding to the energy event and the time data corresponding to the time event at the same timing start point. For example, the conversion module 530 may make the first sampling time at which the scintillation pulse first crosses the lowest sampling threshold in the sampled data worse than the time reference data. The time reference data may be a first trigger time corresponding to a first time event among a plurality of time events corresponding to the plurality of scintillation pulses. The first time difference between the first sampling time and the first triggering time can be used as a target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse after reference conversion.

The compression module 530 may be configured to perform data compression on the target time according to step 130 as described above to obtain a target compression time. The target time may include a first time component (also referred to herein as a coarse time) and a second time component (also referred to herein as a fine time). For data compression of the target time, the first time component may be data compressed to accommodate the compressed first time component using fewer bytes. The compression module 530 may obtain a previous first time composition and take a second time difference between the first time composition and the previous first time composition as a compressed first time composition. The preceding first time component corresponds in rank to a preceding target time of a preceding scintillation pulse. Compression module 530 may also determine a size between a time bit width of the first temporal composition corresponding to a predetermined byte length or an integer multiple of the time bit width. If the first temporal composition is less than the temporal width, compression module 530 may accommodate the first temporal composition with the predetermined byte length. If the first time component is greater than the time bit width or an integer multiple of the time bit width, the compression module 530 may determine a third time difference between the first time component and the time bit width or the integer multiple of the time bit width as the compressed first time component, and accommodate the compressed first time component using the predetermined byte length. The compression module 530 may also determine a difference in bytes of the first temporal composition corresponding to a previous first temporal composition and data compress the first temporal composition based on the difference. The preceding first time component corresponds in rank to a preceding target time of a preceding scintillation pulse. To obtain the difference, compression module 530 may sequentially compare whether the first temporal composition corresponds to the previous first temporal composition for the same number of bytes. If so, the compression module 530 may remove the byte count corresponding to the first time component and ordered first. If not, the compression module 530 may stop comparing and retain the current byte count and the subsequent byte count corresponding to the first time component as the difference. And designating the difference as a first time composition after compression.

The transmission module 540 may be configured to transmit the sampled data and the target compression time to an external device according to step 140 as described above, so that the external device determines energy information and time information of the scintillation pulse based on the sampled data and the target compression time. The intermediate parameters transmitted by the transmission module 540 can greatly reduce the amount of data transmitted, and can greatly reduce the network load. And an external device such as a computer, a server and the like can recover the pulse waveform of the scintillation pulse based on the received sampling data, so as to determine the energy value of the scintillation pulse as corresponding energy information. And simultaneously, the target compression time can be recovered to be the target time of the scintillation pulse, and the target compression time is compared with the first trigger time of all the time events acquired simultaneously to determine the time information of the time event corresponding to the scintillation pulse.

Additional description of the above modules may be found in the flow chart section of the present application, as in fig. 1.

FIG. 6 is an exemplary block diagram of another data processing system according to some embodiments of the present description. The data processing system can realize sampling data processing of the scintillation pulse. As shown in fig. 6, the second data processing system 600 may include a first acquisition module 610, a second acquisition module 620, a decision module 630, and a determination module 640.

The first acquisition module 610 may be configured to acquire sample data of scintillation pulses in accordance with step 210 as described above.

The second acquisition module 620 may be configured to acquire a target compression time corresponding to a first sampling time for the scintillation pulse to first cross a sampling threshold in accordance with step 220 as described above.

The decision module 630 may be configured to determine whether the scintillation pulse corresponds to a real single event based on the sampling data according to step 230 as described above. The decision module 630 may fit an objective function representing the shape of the pulse waveform of the scintillation pulse using the sampling data to determine parameters to be fitted in the objective function. The scintillation pulse energy value can be obtained by integrating the curve of the parameter-determined objective function. The determination module 630 may compare the energy value of the scintillation pulse with a preset energy value, e.g., 511keV, or within an error range, or determine whether the energy value of the scintillation pulse is within a preset energy range that includes a preset energy value, e.g., 511keV, and may determine whether the scintillation pulse corresponds to a true single event. If the energy of the scintillation pulse is in the range of 431-1000 keV, the decision module 630 can determine that the scintillation pulse corresponds to a true single event

The determining module 640 may be configured to determine a target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse based on the target compression time according to step 240 as described above, and determine time information of the real single event based on the target time. The determination module 640 may recover the obtained target compression time to determine the target time. The determination module 640 may obtain a previous first time composition and the first time composition and designate a sum of the previous first time composition and the compressed first time composition as the first time composition. The preceding first time component corresponds in rank to a preceding target time of a preceding scintillation pulse. The determining module 640 may also obtain a multiple relationship between the first time component and a time bit width corresponding to a predetermined byte length, and determine the first time component based on the time bit width, the multiple relationship, and the compressed first time component. The determining module 640 may further obtain a number of bytes of the byte corresponding to the previous first time component, and determine the first time component based on the number of bytes of the byte corresponding to the previous first time component, and the compressed first time component. The preceding first time component corresponds in rank to a preceding target time of a preceding scintillation pulse. When the target time of the scintillation pulse is determined, a comparison can be made with the first trigger times corresponding to all time events. The determination module 640 may compare the first trigger times corresponding to all time events. If the difference between the target time and the first trigger time is within a preset time range, for example, 50ns, the first trigger time can be considered as the time information of the real single event corresponding to the scintillation pulse.

Additional description of the above modules may be found in the flow chart section of the present application, e.g., fig. 1-2.

It should be understood that the systems and modules thereof shown in fig. 5 and 6 may be implemented in a variety of ways. For example, in some embodiments, the system and its modules may be implemented in hardware, software, or a combination of software and hardware. Wherein the hardware portion may be implemented using dedicated logic; the software portions may then be stored in a memory and executed by a suitable instruction execution system, such as a microprocessor or special purpose design hardware. Those skilled in the art will appreciate that the methods and systems described above may be implemented using computer executable instructions and/or embodied in processor control code, such as provided on a carrier medium such as a magnetic disk, CD or DVD-ROM, a programmable memory such as read only memory (firmware), or a data carrier such as an optical or electronic signal carrier. The system of the present specification and its modules may be implemented not only with hardware circuits such as very large scale integrated circuits or gate arrays, semiconductors such as logic chips, transistors, etc., or programmable hardware devices such as field programmable gate arrays, programmable logic devices, etc., but also with software executed by various types of processors, for example, and with a combination of the above hardware circuits and software (e.g., firmware).

It should be noted that the above description of the modules is for convenience of description only and is not intended to limit the present description to the scope of the illustrated embodiments. It will be appreciated by those skilled in the art that, given the principles of the system, various modules may be combined arbitrarily or a subsystem may be constructed in connection with other modules without departing from such principles. For example, each module may share one memory module, or each module may have a respective memory module. Such variations are within the scope of the present description.

Fig. 7 is an exemplary block diagram of a processing device, shown in accordance with some embodiments of the present application. Processing device 700 may include any of the components used to implement the systems described in embodiments of the present application. For example, the processing device 700 may be implemented in hardware, software programs, firmware, or a combination thereof. For example, processing device 700 may implement first data processing system 500 and second data processing system 600. For convenience, only one processing device is depicted, but implementing the computing functions described in embodiments of the present application may be implemented in a distributed manner by a set of similar platforms to distribute the processing load of the system.

In some embodiments, processing device 700 may include a processor 710, a memory 720, an input/output unit 730, and a communication port 740. In some embodiments, processor (e.g., CPU) 710 may execute program instructions in the form of one or more processors. In some embodiments, memory 720 includes different forms of program memory and data memory, such as a hard disk, read-only memory (ROM), random Access Memory (RAM), etc., for storing a wide variety of data files for processing and/or transmission by a computer. In some embodiments, input/output component 730 may be used to support input/output between processing device 700 and other components. In some embodiments, communication port 740 may be connected to a network for enabling data communications. An exemplary processing device may include program instructions stored in read-only memory (ROM), random Access Memory (RAM), and/or other types of non-transitory storage media for execution by processor 710. The methods and/or processes of the embodiments of the present description may be implemented in the form of program instructions. The processing device 700 may also receive the programs and data disclosed in the present application via network communication.

For ease of understanding, only one processor is schematically depicted in fig. 7. It should be noted, however, that the processing device 700 in the embodiments of the present specification may include a plurality of processors, and thus the operations and/or methods described in the embodiments of the present specification as being implemented by one processor may also be implemented by a plurality of processors collectively or individually. For example, if in this specification the processor of the processing device 700 performs steps a and B, it should be understood that steps a and B may also be performed jointly or independently by two different processors of the processing device 700 (e.g., a first processor performing step a, a second processor performing step B, or both the first and second processors jointly performing steps a and B).

The processing method of the scintillation pulse provided by the application can be particularly used in photon detection, and can be applied to various fields, such as medical imaging technology, high-energy physics, laser radar, autopilot, precise analysis, optical communication and the like. In a specific example, the method, apparatus, device and storage medium for processing scintillation pulses provided in the present application may be applied to positron emission computed tomography (PET), where the PET system may be used to reconstruct an image after photon data is acquired using a scheme according to an embodiment of the present application.

Having described the basic concepts herein, it will be apparent to those skilled in the art that the foregoing detailed disclosure is by way of example only and is not intended to be limiting. Although not explicitly described herein, various modifications, improvements, and adaptations to the present disclosure may occur to one skilled in the art. Such modifications, improvements, and modifications are intended to be suggested within this specification, and therefore, such modifications, improvements, and modifications are intended to be included within the spirit and scope of the exemplary embodiments of the present invention.

Meanwhile, the specification uses specific words to describe the embodiments of the specification. Reference to "one embodiment," "an embodiment," and/or "some embodiments" means that a particular feature, structure, or characteristic is associated with at least one embodiment of the present description. Thus, it should be emphasized and should be appreciated that two or more references to "an embodiment" or "one embodiment" or "an alternative embodiment" in various positions in this specification are not necessarily referring to the same embodiment. Furthermore, certain features, structures, or characteristics of one or more embodiments of the present description may be combined as suitable.

Furthermore, those skilled in the art will appreciate that the various aspects of the specification can be illustrated and described in terms of several patentable categories or circumstances, including any novel and useful procedures, machines, products, or materials, or any novel and useful modifications thereof. Accordingly, aspects of the present description may be performed entirely by hardware, entirely by software (including firmware, resident software, micro-code, etc.), or by a combination of hardware and software. The above hardware or software may be referred to as a "data block," module, "" engine, "" unit, "" component, "or" system. Furthermore, aspects of the specification may take the form of a computer product, comprising computer-readable program code, embodied in one or more computer-readable media.

The computer storage medium may contain a propagated data signal with the computer program code embodied therein, for example, on a baseband or as part of a carrier wave. The propagated signal may take on a variety of forms, including electro-magnetic, optical, etc., or any suitable combination thereof. A computer storage medium may be any computer readable medium that can communicate, propagate, or transport a program for use by or in connection with an instruction execution system, apparatus, or device. Program code located on a computer storage medium may be propagated through any suitable medium, including radio, cable, fiber optic cable, RF, or the like, or a combination of any of the foregoing.

The computer program code necessary for operation of portions of the present description may be written in any one or more programming languages, including an object oriented programming language such as Java, scala, smalltalk, eiffel, JADE, emerald, C ++, c#, vb net, python, and the like, a conventional programming language such as C language, visual Basic, fortran 3003, perl, COBOL 3002, PHP, ABAP, a dynamic programming language such as Python, ruby, and Groovy, or the like. The program code may execute entirely on the user's computer or as a stand-alone software package, partly on the user's computer and partly on a remote computer or entirely on the remote computer or server. In the latter scenario, the remote computer may be connected to the user's computer through any form of network, such as a Local Area Network (LAN) or a Wide Area Network (WAN), or the connection may be made to an external computer (for example, through the Internet), or the use of services such as software as a service (SaaS) in a cloud computing environment.

Furthermore, the order in which the elements and sequences are processed, the use of numerical letters, or other designations in the description are not intended to limit the order in which the processes and methods of the description are performed unless explicitly recited in the claims. While certain presently useful inventive embodiments have been discussed in the foregoing disclosure, by way of various examples, it is to be understood that such details are merely illustrative and that the appended claims are not limited to the disclosed embodiments, but, on the contrary, are intended to cover all modifications and equivalent arrangements included within the spirit and scope of the embodiments of the present disclosure. For example, while the system components described above may be implemented by hardware devices, they may also be implemented solely by software solutions, such as installing the described system on an existing server or mobile device.

Likewise, it should be noted that in order to simplify the presentation disclosed in this specification and thereby aid in understanding one or more inventive embodiments, various features are sometimes grouped together in a single embodiment, figure, or description thereof. This method of disclosure, however, is not intended to imply that more features than are presented in the claims are required for the present description. Indeed, less than all of the features of a single embodiment disclosed above.

In some embodiments, numbers describing the components, number of attributes are used, it being understood that such numbers being used in the description of embodiments are modified in some examples by the modifier "about," approximately, "or" substantially. Unless otherwise indicated, "about," "approximately," or "substantially" indicate that the number allows for a 20% variation. Accordingly, in some embodiments, numerical parameters set forth in the specification and claims are approximations that may vary depending upon the desired properties sought to be obtained by the individual embodiments. In some embodiments, the numerical parameters should take into account the specified significant digits and employ a method for preserving the general number of digits. Although the numerical ranges and parameters set forth herein are approximations that may be employed in some embodiments to confirm the breadth of the range, in particular embodiments, the setting of such numerical values is as precise as possible.

Each patent, patent application publication, and other material, such as articles, books, specifications, publications, documents, etc., referred to in this specification is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety. Except for application history documents that are inconsistent or conflicting with the content of this specification, documents that are currently or later attached to this specification in which the broadest scope of the claims to this specification is limited are also. It is noted that, if the description, definition, and/or use of a term in an attached material in this specification does not conform to or conflict with what is described in this specification, the description, definition, and/or use of the term in this specification controls.

Finally, it should be understood that the embodiments described in this specification are merely illustrative of the principles of the embodiments of this specification. Other variations are possible within the scope of this description. Thus, by way of example, and not limitation, alternative configurations of embodiments of the present specification may be considered as consistent with the teachings of the present specification. Accordingly, the embodiments of the present specification are not limited to only the embodiments explicitly described and depicted in the present specification.

Claims

1. A method of processing a scintillation pulse, the method comprising:

performing multi-threshold sampling on the scintillation pulse to obtain sampling data;

based on time reference data, performing reference transformation on the first sampling time of the scintillation pulse included in the sampling data and crossing a sampling threshold value for the first time, and obtaining target time;

data compression is carried out on the target time, and target compression time is obtained;

transmitting the sampled data and the target compression time to an external device, so that the external device can determine energy information and/or time information of the scintillation pulse based on the sampled data and the target compression time.

2. The method of processing a scintillation pulse of claim 1, wherein the acquiring sample data when performing multi-threshold sampling comprises:

Presetting a plurality of thresholds;

for each threshold, comparing the scintillation pulse with the threshold, determining a state change signal when the scintillation pulse crosses the threshold; performing digital time sampling on the state change signal to obtain a corresponding threshold-time pair;

a plurality of threshold-time pairs are specified to form the sample data.

3. The method of processing a scintillation pulse of claim 2, wherein the spacing between the plurality of thresholds is equal.

4. The method of processing a scintillation pulse of claim 1, wherein the scintillation pulse is one of a plurality of scintillation pulses arranged in a sequence based on a first sampling time that first crosses a sampling threshold, the time reference data comprising a first trigger time corresponding to a first time event; the obtaining the target time includes:

designating a first time difference between the first sampling time and the first trigger time as the target time.

5. The method of processing the scintillation pulse of claim 4, wherein the target time comprises a first time component and a second time component, wherein the data compressing the target time comprises data compressing the first time component, comprising:

Acquiring a previous first time component of a previous target time corresponding to a previous scintillation pulse in sequence;

designating a second time difference between the first time component and the preceding first time component as a compressed first time component; wherein the number of bytes used to accommodate the compressed first time component is less than the number of bytes used to accommodate the first time component.

6. The method of processing the scintillation pulse of claim 4, wherein the target time comprises a first time component and a second time component, wherein the data compressing the target time comprises data compressing the first time component, comprising:

determining a size between a time bit width of the first temporal composition corresponding to a predetermined byte length or an integer multiple of the time bit width;

if the first time component is smaller than the time bit width, accommodating the first time component by utilizing the predetermined byte length;

if the first time composition is greater than the time bit width or an integer multiple of the time bit width, determining a third time difference between the first time composition and the time bit width or the integer multiple of the time bit width as a compressed first time composition, and accommodating the compressed first time composition by using the predetermined byte length.

7. The method of processing the scintillation pulse of claim 4, wherein the target time comprises a first time component and a second time component, wherein the data compressing the target time comprises data compressing the first time component, comprising:

determining a difference in bytes of the first temporal composition corresponding to a preceding first temporal composition in ordering, the preceding first temporal composition corresponding to a preceding target time of a preceding scintillation pulse in ordering;

based on the difference, data compression is performed on the first temporal composition.

8. The method of processing a scintillation pulse of claim 7, wherein the bytes are represented in a plurality of byte numbers arranged in a sequence; the determining the difference comprises:

sequentially comparing whether the first time composition is the same as the byte number corresponding to the previous first time composition;

if the byte numbers are the same, removing the byte numbers which are sequenced in front and correspond to the first time component;

if the current byte number and the subsequent byte number are different, stopping comparing and reserving the current byte number and the subsequent byte number corresponding to the first time component, and taking the current byte number and the subsequent byte number as the difference.

9. The method of processing scintillation pulses of claim 8, wherein data compressing the first temporal composition based on the difference comprises:

The difference is specified to represent a first temporal composition after compression.

10. A method of processing a scintillation pulse, the method comprising:

acquiring sampling data of scintillation pulses;

acquiring a target compression time corresponding to a first sampling time when the scintillation pulse first crosses a sampling threshold;

determining whether the scintillation pulse corresponds to a real single event based on the sampling data;

if yes, determining target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse based on the target compression time, and determining time information of the real single event based on the target time.

11. The method of processing a scintillation pulse of claim 10, wherein the determining whether the scintillation pulse corresponds to a true single event based on the sampling data comprises:

determining an objective function corresponding to the scintillation pulse based on the sampling data;

integrating the objective function to determine an energy value of the scintillation pulse;

determining whether the energy value is within a preset energy range;

if yes, determining that the scintillation pulse corresponds to a real single event.

12. The method according to claim 10, wherein the scintillation pulse is one of a plurality of scintillation pulses arranged in sequence, and the target compression time is obtained based on data compression of a target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse; the target time comprises a first time component and a second time component, and the compressed first time component obtained by carrying out data compression on the first time component of the target time is combined with the second time component to form the target compression time.

13. The method for processing the scintillation pulse of claim 12, wherein the determining the target time for the scintillation pulse based on the target compression time comprises:

designating the sum of the previous first time composition and the compressed first time composition as the first time composition.

14. The method for processing the scintillation pulse of claim 12, wherein the determining the target time for the scintillation pulse based on the target compression time comprises:

acquiring a multiple relation between the first time component and a time bit width corresponding to a preset byte length;

and determining the first time composition based on the time bit width, the multiple relation and the compressed first time composition.

15. The method for processing the scintillation pulse of claim 12, wherein the determining the target time for the scintillation pulse based on the target compression time comprises:

acquiring a plurality of byte numbers of bytes corresponding to a previous first time component, the previous first time component corresponding in order to a previous target time of a previous scintillation pulse;

The first temporal composition is determined based on a number of bytes of the bytes corresponding to the previous first temporal composition and the compressed first temporal composition.

16. The method of processing a scintillation pulse of any one of claims 13-15, wherein the determining time information for the real single event based on the target time comprises:

acquiring a plurality of first trigger times corresponding to a plurality of time events;

respectively comparing whether the time difference between the target time and the plurality of first trigger times is within a preset time range;

if yes, determining the first triggering time as the time information of the real single event corresponding to the scintillation pulse.

17. A processing device for scintillation pulses, the processing device comprising:

the sampling module is configured to perform multi-threshold sampling on the scintillation pulse to obtain sampling data;

the conversion module is configured to perform reference conversion on the first sampling time of the scintillation pulse which is included in the sampling data and passes through the sampling threshold value for the first time based on the time reference data, so as to obtain target time;

the compression module is configured to compress the data of the target time to obtain target compression time;

And the transmission module is configured to transmit the sampling data and the target compression time to an external device so that the external device can determine energy information and/or time information of the scintillation pulse based on the sampling data and the target compression time.

18. The scintillation pulse processing apparatus of claim 17, wherein to perform multi-threshold sampling to obtain sampled data, the sampling module is configured to:

presetting a plurality of thresholds;

a plurality of threshold-time pairs are specified to form the sample data.

19. The scintillation pulse processing apparatus of claim 18, wherein the spacing between the plurality of thresholds is equal.

20. The apparatus according to claim 17, wherein the scintillation pulse is one of a plurality of scintillation pulses arranged in sequence based on a first sampling time at which a sampling threshold is first crossed, the time reference data including a first trigger time corresponding to a first time event; to obtain the target time, the conversion module is configured to:

21. The apparatus for processing scintillation pulse of claim 20, wherein the target time comprises a first time component and a second time component, wherein the means for data compressing the target time comprises means for data compressing the first time component, and wherein the means for compressing is configured to:

22. The apparatus for processing scintillation pulse of claim 20, wherein the target time comprises a first time component and a second time component, wherein the means for data compressing the target time comprises means for data compressing the first time component, and wherein the means for compressing is configured to:

23. The apparatus for processing scintillation pulse of claim 20, wherein the target time comprises a first time component and a second time component, wherein the means for data compressing the target time comprises means for data compressing the first time component, and wherein the means for compressing is configured to:

determining a difference in bytes of the first temporal composition corresponding to a previous first temporal composition that corresponds in ordering to a previous target time of a previous scintillation pulse;

24. The apparatus for processing scintillation pulses of claim 23, wherein the bytes are represented in a plurality of byte numbers arranged in a sequence; to determine the difference, the compression module is configured to:

25. The apparatus for processing scintillation pulses of claim 24, wherein to data compress the first temporal composition based on the difference, the compression module is configured to:

26. A processing device for scintillation pulses, the processing device comprising:

the first acquisition module is configured to acquire sampling data of the scintillation pulse;

a second acquisition module configured to acquire a target compression time corresponding to a first sampling time at which the scintillation pulse first crosses a sampling threshold;

a decision module configured to determine whether the scintillation pulse corresponds to a real single event based on the sampling data;

and the determining module is configured to determine a target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse based on the target compression time when the scintillation pulse corresponds to a real single event, and determine time information of the real single event based on the target time.

27. The apparatus for processing scintillation pulses of claim 26, wherein to determine whether the scintillation pulse corresponds to a true single event based on the sampling data, the decision module is configured to:

determining whether the energy value is within a preset energy range;

28. The apparatus according to claim 26, wherein the scintillation pulse is one of a plurality of scintillation pulses arranged in order based on a first sampling time at which the sampling threshold is crossed for the first time, the target compression time being obtained by data compression based on a target time corresponding to the scintillation pulse; the target time comprises a first time component and a second time component, and the compressed first time component obtained by carrying out data compression on the first time component of the target time is combined with the second time component to form the target compression time.

29. The apparatus for processing scintillation pulse of claim 28, wherein to determine a target time for the scintillation pulse based on the target compression time, the determination module is configured to:

30. The apparatus for processing scintillation pulse of claim 28, wherein to determine a target time for the scintillation pulse based on the target compression time, the determination module is configured to:

31. The apparatus for processing scintillation pulse of claim 28, wherein to determine a target time for the scintillation pulse based on the target compression time, the determination module is configured to:

32. The apparatus according to any one of claims 29-31, wherein to determine the time information of the real single event based on the target time, the determining module is configured to:

33. A processing apparatus, comprising: memory, a processor and a computer program stored on the memory and executable on the processor, which when executed by the processor, implements the steps of the processing method according to any of claims 1-16.

34. A computer-readable storage medium, on which a computer program is stored which, when being executed by a processor, carries out the steps of the processing method according to any one of claims 1 to 16.