Experimentally validated x-ray image simulations of 50 μm x-ray PIV tracer particles

Abstract We evaluate Beer–Lambert (BL) ray-tracing and Monte Carlo N-Particle (MCNP) photon tracking simulations for prediction comparison of x-ray imaging system performance. These simulation tools can aid the methodical design laboratory-scale particle image velocimetry (XPIV) experiments tracer particles by predicting quality. Particle signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) is used as metric Simulated experiment data hollow, silver-coated, glass sphere (AGSF-33) are compared. As predicted simulations, AGSF-33 visible with a SNR greater than unity in 100 ms exposure time images, demonstrating their potential PIV or (XPTV) tracers. The BL approach predicts contrast, computationally inexpensive, enables exploration vast parameter space design. MCNP on other hand, predict images slightly more accurately, but an order magnitude expensive simulations. For most practical XPIV applications, higher computational expense likely not justified modest accuracy improvement compared to BL.