Scott S. Hsieh, Ph.D.

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SUMMARY

Mayo Clinic researcher Scott S. Hsieh, Ph.D., studies advanced computerized tomography (CT) technology. The use of CT imaging for medical diagnosis continues to increase. Improved CT technology can create better images with less radiation or enable new clinical applications to better identify disease states in existing images. Dr. Hsieh's work includes X-ray source and detector engineering, CT system design, clinical applications, and human perception of CT images. He is a member of the CT Clinical Innovation Center.

Focus areas

• Photon counting detectors. New photon counting detectors provide several potential advantages for CT imaging, including higher spatial resolution, spectral imaging capability and more efficient use of radiation dose. Dr. Hsieh is working on improving both the X-ray sensors and the processing circuits of these detectors so that future CT scanners can see more benefit from this technology.
• Radiologist perception of CT images. Radiologists routinely review hundreds of images per scan in only a few minutes. Sometimes, low-contrast lesions are missed. In rare cases, this can delay the diagnosis of critical disease states such as newly metastatic cancer. Dr. Hsieh investigates human perception of these images with eye tracking technology to understand why lesions may be missed and how to reduce missed lesions in the future.
• System design. By changing the design of individual CT components or introducing new components, the basic capabilities of the CT scanner can be improved or targeted toward specific applications. Dr. Hsieh is developing new pre-patient attenuators that optimize the use of radiation dose, new x-ray tomosynthesis geometries that can provide imaging feedback for ablative lung radiation therapy, dual energy projection radiography systems to identify early stages of heart disease, and new reconstruction algorithms that can be applied to pulse echo ultrasound to extract speed of sound information.

Significance to patient care

The goal of Dr. Hsieh's research is to make CT scanners better. Radiology has benefitted greatly from the continued technical improvement of CT scanners, including increases in temporal resolution, spatial resolution, x-ray dose efficiency and dual energy imaging. These improvements continue to make CT scanners safer and more effective at diagnosis. By improving scanner technology, we can make CT scans more useful for all kinds of patients receiving scans for many different reasons.