MEMS techniques applied to the fabrication of anti-scatter grids for X-ray imaging

This paper reports a promising method for the fabrication of lead collimators for X-ray radiology applications. The fabrication method is based on arrays of macropores etched into a silicon wafer using an electrochemical process. The macropores are filled with lead and the silicon substrate is removed subsequently. The macroporous silicon structure thereby acts as a sacrificial layer. The use of MEMS techniques enables us to decrease the size of the structure by one order of magnitude compared to conventional collimators, thus increasing the optical resolution of the X-ray system.