Method for calibrating a radiation detection medium

1. A method for calibrating a radiation detection medium comprising:

exposing arbitrary areas of a radiation detection medium to a plurality of known radiation dose levels wherein each exposed arbitrary area is in a location and corresponds to a known radiation dose level,

scanning the exposed detection medium and automatically determining the location for each exposed arbitrary area,

measuring each of the exposed arbitrary areas,

matching each measurement for the exposed arbitrary areas with the corresponding radiation dose level, thereby generating an array of paired data values for radiation dose level and measured exposure, and

calculating a calibration based on the array of paired data values.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the exposed arbitrary areas containing the plurality of known dose levels form a spatial pattern of doses.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein the spatial pattern of dose levels is comprised of a plurality of discrete areas within each of which the dose level is substantially uniform.

4. The method of claim 3 , wherein said plurality of known radiation dose levels comprises from about 3 to about 25 different dose levels.

5. The method of claim 3 , wherein said known radiation dose levels fall within the range of from about 1 cGy to about 1000 cGy.

6. The method of claim 3 , wherein the step of automatically determining a location for each exposed arbitrary area comprises identifying areas of a specified dimension with a uniformity of plus or minus 10%.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein said uniformity is plus or minus 5%.

8. The method of claim 2 wherein the spatial pattern of dose levels is a pattern of continuously varying dose levels.

9. The method of claim 1 , wherein said radiation-sensitive medium is a radiochromic self-developing film.

10. The radiation-sensitive medium of claim 9 , wherein said radiochromic self-developing film includes a substantially crystalline image receptive polyacetylenic compound having the structure:

A-(CH 2 ) n —C═C—C═C—(CH 2 ) m —B

wherein m and n are both independently an integer from 6 to 14 and A and B are independent from one another and are selected from the group consisting of methyl, carboxyl, hydroxy, amido, lower alkyl substituted amido, aliphatic or aromatic carboxylate ester group having up to 10 carbon atoms, mono- or di-valent carboxylate metal salt group, halo, carbamyl, lower alkyl substituted carbamyl or tosyl, triyn or tetrayne products of the above polyacetylenes having from 20 to 60 carbon atoms and a conjugated structure, and combinations thereof.

11. A method for calibrating a radiation detection medium comprising:

irradiating a radiation detection medium with at least three different radiation dose levels, each dose level being applied to an arbitrary area on the detection medium to produce an exposed detection medium comprising random irradiated areas,

capturing an image of the exposed detection medium to form a scanned image,

analyzing the scanned image to detect each of the irradiated areas on the detection medium,

determining the dose level corresponding to each irradiated area, and

calculating a calibration for the detection medium based on density as a function of dose level.

12. The method of claim 11 , wherein the step of analyzing the scanned image to detect each of the irradiated areas on the detection medium comprises measuring density of each of the irradiated areas.

13. The method of claim 12 , wherein the irradiated areas are selected based on predetermined criteria for image size and uniformity.

14. The method of claim 11 , wherein said radiation sensitive medium is a radiochromic self-developing film.