New “Yemingzhu” nanomaterials allow mobile phones to take X-rays

China Powder Network News The situation that China’s high-end X-ray imaging equipment and key components depend on imports is expected to change! The reporter learned from Fuzhou University on 18th that the research team led by Professor Yang Huanghao, Professor Chen Qiushui and Professor Liu Xiaogang of National University of Singapore took the lead in finding a kind of high-performance nano-scintillation long afterglow material in the world.And successfully developed a new type of flexible X-ray imaging technology, so that conventional SLR cameras and mobile phones can also take X-rays. This original achievement was published online in the international authoritative magazine Nature on 18th. It is introduced that traditional X-ray imaging equipment is difficult to image curved surfaces and irregular objects in 3D X-ray, and there are some problems such as huge volume and expensive equipment.Compared with traditional rigid devices, flexible electronics devices, as a new technology, have greater flexibility and can adapt to different working environments. But the key technology of flexible X-ray imaging has been difficult to overcome. Long afterglow refers to a kind of luminescence phenomenon that can continue to emit light for several seconds or even several hours after the excitation light such as ultraviolet visible light and X-ray stops.For example, the legendary night pearl can continuously shine in the dark. “Based on the unique luminescent properties of long afterglow materials, we use long afterglow materials to realize flexible X-ray imaging for the first time, but traditional long afterglow materials need to be prepared at high temperature and the particles are too large to be used to prepare flexible devices.” Yang Hao said. In view of the above bottleneck problem,Researchers get inspiration from rare earth halide lattices and prepare new rare earth nano scintillation long afterglow materials. On this basis, a transparent, stretchable and high-resolution flexible X-ray imaging device was successfully developed by combining nano-scintillator long afterglow material with flexible substrate.This technology has the advantages of simple preparation process, low cost and excellent imaging performance. It has shown great potential and application value in portable X-ray detector, biomedicine, industrial flaw detection, high energy physics and other fields. Relevant experts said that this research subverts the traditional X-ray imaging technology and will vigorously promote the localization of high-end X-ray imaging equipment.It marks that China has entered the international advanced ranks in flexible X-ray imaging technology.