A technologist accidentally uses a lower mAs than appropriate on a radiograph of the chest. What digital process is used to display the image as if the image receptor was exposed correctly?

When a technologist uses a lower mAs than the appropriate value for a radiograph, the resulting image may appear underexposed with increased noise and insufficient detail. To correct for this and ensure the image is displayed as if it had been exposed correctly, the digital system employs a process known as rescaling.

Rescaling is a technique used in digital radiography that adjusts the image data to fit a predefined histogram of expected values. When an image is exposed to a lower mAs, the digital processing algorithms analyze the data and transform it to achieve an output that matches the optimal exposure levels for that specific type of radiographic examination. This allows for an image that has the appearance of being correctly exposed, even though the original exposure was suboptimal. It helps improve visibility of structures and enhances diagnostic quality despite the initial underexposure.

Other options involve different processes. Interpolation relates to estimating new data points within a set of known values, often used for image reconstruction rather than correcting exposure issues. Normalization generally refers to adjusting values measured on different scales to a common scale, which isn't specifically tailored to exposure corrections in radiographs. Noise filtering is a method to reduce unwanted signals in the image but does not directly compensate for underexposure in the way res