NSF Award
9861538
9861538<br/> Structural biology is an eminent branch of biological science research where the three-dimensional structure of proteins and other macromolecules is determined and is related to the biological flinction of these molecules. Macro-molecular crystallography provides the 3D distribution of atoms, which is extremely important in the fields such as erizymology, immunology, protein assembly and bioengineering. Synchrotron X-ray sources hold great promise for structural biology, however, they have not yet realized their potential as analytical tools because of the lack of appropriate position sensitive "area" detectors. Current detectors fail to meet the requirements of data collection for critical reasons related to spatial resolution, dynamic range, sensitivity, and speed of response. To address these limitations, we propose to develop a novel large area detector based on a new generation of micro-pixelized scintillator. The micro-pixelized scintillator will provide a unique combination of very high sensitivity, spatial resolution, and signal to noise ratios. When integrated with a large area digital optical detector it will allow a wide dynamic range and substantially enhanced throughput at relatively low costs.<br/> In addition to the structural biology application, the proposed large area micro-pixelized scintillator would find widespread use in instrumentation wherever high-resolution X-ray imaging is used. A novel imaging system formed by coupling these sensors to digital optical detectors may be applied to medical imaging, non-destructive testing, X-ray astronomy and basic physics experiments. Currently X-ray imaging market is estimated to be in hundreds of millions of dollars and substantial fraction of this market represents where the proposed high-resolution scintillator technology would have a significant impact.
