Two-dimensional diced scintillator array for innovative, fine-resolution gamma camera

We are developing a technique to fabricate fine spatial resolution (FWHM<0.5mm) and cost-effective photon counting detectors, by using silicon photomultipliers (SiPMs) coupled with a finely pixelated scintillator plate. Unlike traditional X-ray imagers that use a micro-columnar CsI(Tl) plate, we can pixelate various scintillation crystal plates more than 1 mm thick, and easily develop large-area, fine-pitch scintillator arrays with high precision. Coupling a fine pitch scintillator array with a SiPM array results in a compact, fast-response detector that is ideal for X-ray, gamma-ray, and charged particle detection as used in autoradiography, gamma cameras, and photon counting CTs. As the first step, we fabricated a 2-D, cerium-doped Gd3Al2Ga3O12 (Ce:GAGG) scintillator array of 0.25 mm pitch, by using a dicing saw to cut micro-grooves 50μm wide into a 1.0 mm thick Ce:GAGG plate. The scintillator plate is optically coupled with a 3.0×3.0mm pixel 4×4 SiPM array and read-out via the resistive charge-division network. Even when using this simple system as a gamma camera, we obtained excellent spatial resolution of 0.48 mm (FWHM) for 122 keV gamma-rays. We will present our plans to further improve the signal-to-noise ratio in the image, and also discuss a variety of possible applications in the near future.