Micro-computed tomography for analysis of urinary calculi

Micro-computed tomographic (micro CT) imaging has become an important tool for the study of urinary stones. The method involves the collection of a series of X-ray pictures of the stone as it is rotated, and the internal structure of the stone is computationally reconstructed from these pictures. The entire process takes from 30 min to an hour with present technology. Resulting images of the stone provide unprecedented detail of the mineral composition and its morphological arrangement within the stone. For smaller stones, reconstructions can easily have voxel sizes of