P. Büchele et al. Nature Photonics, November 2015

A team including Warwick beamline scientist Oier Bikondoa has published in Nature Photonics a new approach to fabricate more efficient and cheaper X-ray detectors for medical applications. In radiography, the human body is exposed to X-rays and the transmitted intensity is captured by a detector. With more efficient detectors the exposure to X-rays can be reduced.

The team has developed several X-ray image sensors using particles that scintillate when illuminated with X-rays, embedded into a blend of organic semiconductors (bulk-heterojunction). The efficiency of these sensors to convert light into electrical charges is significantly better that other X-ray sensor types. Part of the research has been carried out at the EPSRC-funded XMaS mid-range facility in Grenoble (France), which is managed by the Universities of Warwick and Liverpool.

The article “X-ray imaging with scintillator-sensitized hybrid organic photodetectors” can be accessed online at Nature Photonics.