Visualization in Industrial X-ray Computed Tomography

This book provides the first book at the intersection of visualization and X-ray computed tomography. Visualization in industrial X-ray computed tomography (XCT) has become highly attractive for research endeavors in various domains. While XCT as a non-destructive imaging technique generates detailed information of the specimens of interest regarding their structures and characteristics, the visualization of respective data facilitates novel, previously impossible insights. An in-depth understanding of complex phenomena at multiple scales, in different dimensions, or using different modalities may be facilitated. Major challenges are found in the huge variety of scanned objects and dataset sizes that almost routinely reach the terabyte range; all this requires for a careful rethinking of methods on data handling and visualization. This book, concepted at the intersection of the two almost orthogonal domains of visualization and industrial XCT, compiles the state of the art and integrates some of the latest advancements in variety of fields. It presents contributions from mathematical concepts to visual metaphors as well as respective algorithms and data structures. It discusses current applications as well as upcoming research streams in different aspects of the visualization pipeline. The structure of the book builds upon in three main parts: Fundamental Concepts: XCT requires the discussion of definitions, concepts, and theory. In this part XCT modalities are discussed from attenuation to phase contrast, dark field imaging, and beyond as well as related thereto the current state in XCT technology. Regarding data the definition of "Rich XCT data" is introduced resembling the complexity of primary and secondary derived data, as well as ensembles thereof for the analysis of temporal evolutions. The Visualization Pipeline: Following an introduction of XCT data visualization, specific XCT visualization topics are addressed in the second part of the book. These cover multivariate data analysis, visual analysis of high dimensional data, imaging and tracking dynamic phenomena, topology-driven approaches, immersive analytics, visualization of quantitative data as well as uncertainty quantification and visualization. Furthermore, specific aspects of preprocessing are covered from reconstruction of XCT data, global and local (de-)compression as well as segmentation of relevant features. Applications: The third part demonstrates industrial applications in outstanding case studies of XCT visualization. These case studies cover quantitative 3D-4D materials science for aeronautic applications, quantifying tomographic images of fiber-reinforced composites or visual computing at large scientific facilities.