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Mathematical Theory behind the CT Scanner-Beginnings of Digital Image Processing. Cormack, Allan M. (1924-98). (1) Representation of a function by its line integrals, with some radiological applications. In J. Applied Physics 34 (1963): 2722-27. Whole number. 2535-2922pp. Text illustrations. (2) Representation of a function by its line integrals, with some radiological applications. II. In J. Applied Physics 35 (1964): 2908-13. Whole number. 2789-3102pp. Text illustrations. The two numbers bound together in library buckram, Light toning, otherwise very good. First Edition. Cormack's two-part paper, published in the early 1960s, set forth the mathematical theory of axial tomography, the method by which the varying X-ray absorption rates of tissues in the human body can be used to construct a detailed picture of the organs and soft tissues. For this achievement Cormack shared the 1979 Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine with Godfrey Hounsfield, who in 1973 invented the first practical computer-assisted tomography (CT) scanner. "This was the first time that researchers trained not in the medical sciences but in mathematics and engineering received the Nobel Prize in Medicine" (Grolier Medical Hundred, p. 365). Cormack, who was educated as a physicist, first became interested in axial tomography in 1956, when, as the only nuclear physicist in Cape Town, S.A., he was asked to spend several hours each week supervising the use of radioactive isotopes at the Cape Town hospital. He became interested in determining values of attenuation coefficients for X-rays, realizing that these values could be displayed as a gray-scale image of internal anatomy. "Recognizing the problem as a mathematical one, [Cormack] produced a solution, using a desktop calculator, and was able to conduct experiments in which he reconstructed accurate cross sections of an irregularly shaped object. His reconstructions were, in essence, the first computed tomograms, but though he realized that his method could be used to produce cross-sectional X-ray images, no working machine designed for such a purpose was attempted, probably because of the limitations of the computers of the early 1960s" (Magill, The Nobel Prize Winners: Physiology or Medicine, III, 1325). Cormack's paper is a foundation document of digital image processing. Grolier Medical Hundred, 100(n). .
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