X-ray simulations with gVXR in education, digital twining, experiment planning, and data analysis
Journal article, 2025
gVirtualXray (gVXR) is an open-source framework that relies on the Beer–Lambert law to simulate X-ray images in real time on a graphics processor unit (GPU) using triangular meshes. A wide range of programming languages is supported (C/C++, Python, R, Ruby, Tcl, C#, Java, and GNU Octave). Simulations generated with gVXR have been benchmarked with clinically realistic phantoms (i.e. complex structures and materials) using Monte Carlo (MC) simulations, real radiographs and real digitally reconstructed radiographs (DRRs), and X-ray computed tomography (XCT). It has been used in a wide range of applications, including real-time medical simulators, proposing a new densitometric radiographic modality in clinical imaging, studying noise removal techniques in fluoroscopy, teaching particle physics and X-ray imaging to undergraduate students in engineering, and XCT to masters students, predicting image quality and artifacts in material science, etc. gVXR has also been used to produce a high number of realistic simulated images in optimisation problems and to train machine learning algorithms. This paper presents a comprehensive review of such applications of gVXR.
Machine learning
Digital twinning
X-ray imaging
Simulation
GPU programming
Computed tomography
Registration
Author
Franck P. Vidal
Daresbury Laboratory
Bangor University
Shaghayegh Afshari
National Taiwan University
Sharif Ahmed
Diamond Light Source
Alberto Albiol
Polytechnic University of Valencia (UPV)
Francisco Albiol
Polytechnic University of Valencia (UPV)
Éric Béchet
University of Liège
Alberto Corbí Bellot
University of La Rioja
Stefan Bosse
University of Siegen
Universität Koblenz
Simon Burkhard
Federal Institute of Metrology METAS
Younes Chahid
Royal Observatory
Cheng Ying Chou
National Taiwan University
Robert Culver
Manufacturing Technology Centre (MTC)
Pascal Desbarats
Laboratoire Bordelais de Recherche en Informatique
Lewis Dixon
Bangor University
Johan Friemann
Chalmers, Industrial and Materials Science, Material and Computational Mechanics
Amin Garbout
University of Manchester
Marcos García-Lorenzo
Rey Juan Carlos University (URJC)
Jean François Giovannelli
Laboratoire de l’Intégration du Matériau au Système
Ross Hanna
Manufacturing Technology Centre (MTC)
Clémentine Hatton
Scalian
Audrey Henry
Scalian
Graham Kelly
Royal Shrewsbury Hospital
Christophe Leblanc
University of Liège
Alberto Leonardi
Diamond Light Source
Jean Michel Létang
CREATIS (Centre de Recherche en Acquisition et Traitement de l'Image pour la Santé)
Harry Lipscomb
University of Manchester
Tristan Manchester
Diamond Light Source
Bas Meere
Eindhoven University of Technology
Claire Michelet
University of Bordeaux
Simon C. Middleburgh
Bangor University
Radu P. Mihail
Valdosta State University
Iwan Mitchell
Bangor University
Liam Perera
Diamond Light Source
Martí Puig
University of Oxford
University of Manchester
Malek Racy
Salford Royal Hospital
Ali Rouwane
University of Bordeaux
Hervé Seznec
University of Bordeaux
Aaron Sújar
Rey Juan Carlos University (URJC)
Jenna Tugwell-Allsup
Ysbyty Gwynedd Hospital
Pierre Frédéric Villard
University of Lorraine
Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research, Section B: Beam Interactions with Materials and Atoms
0168-583X (ISSN)
Vol. 568 165804Subject Categories (SSIF 2025)
Radiology and Medical Imaging
DOI
10.1016/j.nimb.2025.165804