Formation Of A Color Map For An Elastic Image

• US 20100036250A1
• Filed: 08/04/2009
• Published: 02/11/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 08/05/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Samsung Medison Company Limited (Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Medison Co., Ltd. (Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.)
• Inventors: Shin, Dong Kuk, Kim, Jong Sik
• Granted Patent: US 9,629,605 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 600/443
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 8/08 Detecting organic movements or changes, e.g. tumours, cysts, swellings A61B8/02 - A61B8/06 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 8/14 Echo-tomography
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 8/485 involving measuring strain or elastic properties
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 7/52042 determining elastic properties of the propagation medium or of the reflective target diagnostic techniques involving the measurement of strain A61B8/485
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 7/52071 Multicolour displays; using colour coding; Optimising colour or information content in displays, e.g. parametric imaging

Abstract

Embodiments for forming a color map necessary for forming an elastic image in an ultrasound system. A transmission/reception (Tx/Rx) unit transmits ultrasound signals to a target object and receives ultrasound echo signals reflected from the target object to thereby obtain receive signals. The receive signals include first receive signals obtained before applying a stress to the target object and second receive signals obtained after applying a stress to the target object. An ultrasound data forming unit forms first and second ultrasound data based on the first and second receive signals, respectively. A processing unit computes strains by using the first and second ultrasound data and form a histogram based on the computed strains. The processing unit further clusters the histogram for separation into a plurality of clusters and forms a color map including a plurality of color map regions corresponding to the respective clusters.

Claims

1. An ultrasound system, comprising:

a transmission/reception (Tx/Rx) unit operable to transmit ultrasound signals to a target object and receive ultrasound echo signals reflected from the target object to thereby obtain receive signals, the receive signals including first receive signals obtained before applying a stress to the target object and second receive signals obtained after applying a stress to the target object;

an ultrasound data forming unit operable to form first and second ultrasound data based on the first and second receive signals, respectively; and

a processing unit operable to compute strains by using the first and second ultrasound data and form a histogram of the computed strains, the processing unit being further operable to cluster the histogram for separation into a plurality of clusters and form a color map including a plurality of color map regions corresponding to the respective clusters.

2. The ultrasound system of claim 1, wherein the processing unit includes:

a displacement computing section operable to compute displacements by comparing the first and second ultrasound data;

a strain computing section operable to compute the strains based on the computed displacements;

a strain normalizing section operable to normalize the strains;

a histogram forming section operable to form the histogram of the normalized strains;

a clustering section operable to cluster the histogram to separate the histogram into the plurality of clusters; and

a color map forming section operable to form the color map including the plurality of color map regions corresponding to the respective clusters.

3. The ultrasound system of claim 2, wherein the color map regions are mapped to different colors.

4. The ultrasound system of claim 2, wherein the color map regions are mapped to a color having different brightness from each other.

5. The ultrasound system of claim 2, wherein the strain normalizing section is further operable to:

detect maximum and minimum strains from the strains computed by the strain computing section; and

map the strains to values ranging from 0 to 255, wherein the minimum strain is mapped to 0 and the maximum strain is mapped to 255.

6. The ultrasound system of claim 2, wherein the strain normalizing section is further operable to:

compute mean and standard deviation of the strains computed by the strain computing section;

perform an operation of (mean−

2×

standard deviation) to set the operation result as a minimum value;

perform an operation of (mean+2×

standard deviation) to set the operation result as a maximum value; and

map the strains to values ranging from the maximum value of 0 to the maximum value of 255.

7. The ultrasound system of claim 2, wherein the clustering section is further configured to cluster the histogram to find at least one threshold and separate the histogram into the plurality of clusters based on the threshold.

8. A method of forming a color map for an elastic image in an ultrasound system, comprising:

a) transmitting ultrasound signals to a target object and receiving ultrasound echo signals reflected from the target object to thereby obtain receive signals, the receive signals including first receive signals obtained before applying a stress to the target object and second receive signals obtained after applying a stress to the target object;

b) forming first and second ultrasound data based on the first and second receive signals, respectively;

c) compute strains by using the first and second ultrasound data;

d) forming a histogram of the computed strains;

e) clustering the histogram for separation into a plurality of clusters; and

f) forming a color map including a plurality of color map regions corresponding to the respective clusters.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the c) includes:

c1) computing displacements by comparing the first and second ultrasound data;

c2) computing the strains based on the computed displacements;

c3) normalizing the strains;

c4) forming the histogram of the normalized strains;

c5) clustering the histogram to separate the histogram into the plurality of clusters; and

c6) forming the color map including the plurality of color map regions corresponding to the respective clusters.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the color map regions are mapped to different colors.

11. The method of claim 9, wherein the color map regions are mapped to a color having different brightness from each other.

12. The method of claim 9, wherein the c3 includes:

detecting maximum and minimum strains from the strains; and

mapping the strains to values ranging from 0 to 255, wherein the minimum strain is mapped to 0 and the maximum strain is mapped to 255.

13. The method of claim 9, wherein the c3) includes:

computing mean and standard deviation of the strains;

performing an operation of (mean−

2×

standard deviation) to set the operation result as a minimum value;

performing an operation of (mean+2×

standard deviation) to set the operation result as a maximum value; and

mapping the strains to values ranging from 0 to 255 with reference to the maximum and minimum values.

14. The method of claim 9, wherein the c5) includes clustering the histogram to find at least one threshold, and separating the histogram into the plurality of clusters based on the threshold.