Application of materials used in everyday life to create radiological models of human tissues

Abstract

Radiological physical models (phantoms) are used for quality control, for evaluation and analysis of a given X-ray device. They are easily available, providing the X-ray technicians with consistent results and safety compared to using a live subject. Phantoms must respond in the same or similar way to human tissues and organs when exposed to radiation, and therefore must be manufactured from materials with the same or similar X-ray properties. The purpose of this report is to study materials from everyday life as suitable substitutes for human tissues in quality control tasks. In daily life, everything we come in contact with could be used as a material for a physical phantom: plastic, wood, glass, water, salt, sugar, gelatin, paraffin, and others. Due to the advantages of plastic—cheap, flexible, waterproof, and easy to manufacture, it becomes a reliable material in many fields, including 3D printing. After the physical model is printed, it should be checked whether or not it is the same or similar to the real human tissues. All results are processed by using the DICOM processing program (Digital Imaging and Communication in Medicine) by comparing the density using the Hounsfield units scale