Slanthole collimators feature holes angled relative to the detector face rather than perpendicular, enabling unique imaging geometries that improve sensitivity and enable stationary SPECT acquisition. Nuclear Shields manufactures slanthole and segmented slanthole collimators for cardiac imaging and specialized SPECT applications.

Angled geometry for enhanced performance

Unlike parallel hole collimators where all holes point straight forward, slanthole collimators have holes tilted at a defined angle—typically 20° to 30° from perpendicular. This angulation provides several imaging advantages: The tilted viewing angle allows the collimator to "look around" intervening structures, potentially reducing attenuation artifacts in cardiac imaging where the heart lies behind ribs and soft tissue. More significantly, segmented slanthole designs with multiple differently-angled sections can acquire projection data from several view angles simultaneously, dramatically improving sensitivity compared to conventional rotating SPECT.

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Pinhole collimators achieve the highest spatial resolution of any collimator type, using a single small aperture to create magnified, inverted images of small organs and structures. Nuclear Shields manufactures pinhole collimators for clinical thyroid imaging, pediatric applications, and preclinical small-animal research.

Multi-pinhole configurations

The low sensitivity of single-pinhole imaging has driven development of multi-pinhole collimators, particularly for preclinical small-animal SPECT. Multiple pinholes viewing the same source volume increase sensitivity proportionally while maintaining high resolution, at the cost of image overlap (multiplexing) that must be resolved during reconstruction. Nuclear Shields manufactures multi-pinhole collimators for preclinical imaging systems, with aperture configurations optimized for specific detector geometries and target resolutions.

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The parallel hole collimator is the most widely used collimator type in clinical nuclear medicine, providing versatile imaging performance for planar scintigraphy and SPECT acquisition. Nuclear Shields manufactures parallel hole collimators in configurations optimized for the full range of diagnostic radioisotopes and clinical applications.

How parallel hole collimation works

In a parallel hole collimator, thousands of closely packed holes extend perpendicular to the detector face, with each hole aligned parallel to its neighbors. Only gamma photons traveling approximately perpendicular to the detector surface can pass through the holes. Photons arriving at angles are absorbed by the lead septa separating the holes. This geometry produces a one-to-one relationship between object and image size. Unlike pinhole or converging collimators, parallel hole designs neither magnify nor minify the image, simplifying interpretation and quantification. The field of view remains constant regardless of source-to-collimator distance.

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Fanbeam collimators combine the benefits of converging geometry with practical whole-organ coverage, providing improved resolution and sensitivity for brain, cardiac, and other organ-specific SPECT imaging. Nuclear Shields manufactures fanbeam collimators optimized for clinical neurological and cardiac applications.

Hybrid geometry for practical imaging

The fanbeam collimator represents a hybrid between fully converging (cone-beam) and parallel hole designs. Holes converge toward a focal line in the transaxial plane while remaining parallel in the axial direction. This creates a "fan" of acceptance angles across the width of the detector while maintaining uniform coverage along its length. This geometry provides the resolution and sensitivity advantages of converging collimation in the critical transaxial imaging plane, where spatial resolution most directly affects diagnostic quality, while avoiding the truncation and limited axial coverage problems of full cone-beam designs.

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Converging and diverging collimators use non-parallel hole geometries that focus or spread the acceptance pattern, providing image magnification or expanded field of view compared to standard parallel hole designs. Nuclear Shields manufactures both converging and diverging collimators for specialized nuclear medicine imaging applications.

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