X-ray Dark-Field Imaging for Improved Contrast in Historical Handwritten Literature

Akstaller B, Schreiner S, Dietrich L, Rauch C, Schuster M, Ludwig V, Hofmann-Randall C, Michel T, Anton G, Funk S (2022)


Publication Type: Journal article

Publication year: 2022

Journal

Book Volume: 8

Article Number: 226

Journal Issue: 9

DOI: 10.3390/jimaging8090226

Abstract

If ancient documents are too fragile to be opened, X-ray imaging can be used to recover the content non-destructively. As an extension to conventional attenuation imaging, dark-field imaging provides access to microscopic structural object information, which can be especially advantageous for materials with weak attenuation contrast, such as certain metal-free inks in paper. With cotton paper and different self-made inks based on authentic recipes, we produced test samples for attenuation and dark-field imaging at a metal-jet X-ray source. The resulting images show letters written in metal-free ink that were recovered via grating-based dark-field imaging. Without the need for synchrotron-like beam quality, these results set the ground for a mobile dark-field imaging setup that could be brought to a library for document scanning, avoiding long transport routes for valuable historic documents.

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How to cite

APA:

Akstaller, B., Schreiner, S., Dietrich, L., Rauch, C., Schuster, M., Ludwig, V.,... Funk, S. (2022). X-ray Dark-Field Imaging for Improved Contrast in Historical Handwritten Literature. Journal of Imaging, 8(9). https://doi.org/10.3390/jimaging8090226

MLA:

Akstaller, Bernhard, et al. "X-ray Dark-Field Imaging for Improved Contrast in Historical Handwritten Literature." Journal of Imaging 8.9 (2022).

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