Broad-beam imaging
First Claim
Patent Images
1. A method of probing a material under investigation comprising the steps of:
- using a plurality of ultrasound transducers to transmit an ultrasound beam into the material under investigation;
receiving echoes generated by interactions between the ultrasound beam and the material under investigation;
generating first data from the received echoes, the first data having a plurality of values associatable with time and with a first number of positions in a first spatial dimension, the first number of positions being more than one; and
generating second data from the first data, the second data having values associatable with a second spatial dimension and with a second number of positions in the first spatial dimension, the first number of positions being fewer than the second number of positions;
wherein at least one of the values of the second data, associatable with one of the second number of positions but not with any of the first number of positions, is generated without interpolation between values of the first data.
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Abstract
Systems and methods of probing a material under investigation using an ultrasound beam. Echolocation data is generated using a multi-dimensional transform capable of using phase and magnitude information to distinguish echoes resulting from ultrasound beam components produced using different ultrasound transducers. Since the multi-dimensional transform does not depend on using receive or transmit beam lines, a multi-dimensional area can be imaged using a single ultrasound transmission. In some embodiments, this ability increases image frame rate and reduces the amount of ultrasound energy required to generate an image.
110 Citations
13 Claims
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1. A method of probing a material under investigation comprising the steps of:
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using a plurality of ultrasound transducers to transmit an ultrasound beam into the material under investigation;
receiving echoes generated by interactions between the ultrasound beam and the material under investigation;
generating first data from the received echoes, the first data having a plurality of values associatable with time and with a first number of positions in a first spatial dimension, the first number of positions being more than one; and
generating second data from the first data, the second data having values associatable with a second spatial dimension and with a second number of positions in the first spatial dimension, the first number of positions being fewer than the second number of positions;
wherein at least one of the values of the second data, associatable with one of the second number of positions but not with any of the first number of positions, is generated without interpolation between values of the first data. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5)
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6. A method of probing a material under investigation comprising the steps of:
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using a plurality of transducers to transmit a plurality of ultrasound beams into the material under investigation;
receiving first echoes generated by interactions between a first member of the plurality of ultrasound beams and the material under investigation;
generating first echo data from the received first echoes, the first echo data having values associatable with a temporal dimension and separately associatable with more than one position in at least a first spatial dimension, the values including phase and magnitude information;
receiving second echoes generated by interactions between at least a second member of the plurality of ultrasound beams and the material under investigation;
generating second echo data from the received second echoes, the second echo data having values associatable with a temporal dimension and separately associatable with more than one position in at least a second spatial dimension;
generating first echolocation data using the first echo data and a data transform responsive to the phase or magnitude information;
using the second echo data to generate second echolocation data; and
combining the first and the second echolocation data to produce third echolocation data having the same dimensionality as the first echolocation data. - View Dependent Claims (7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13)
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Specification