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Ultrasound imaging system memory architecture

  • US 9,986,969 B2
  • Filed: 08/20/2013
  • Issued: 06/05/2018
  • Est. Priority Date: 09/06/2012
  • Status: Active Grant
First Claim
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1. A method of producing an image from ultrasound data, comprising the steps of:

  • retrieving a first data set from a first non-volatile digital memory device with a computing system, the first data set comprising data describing first transmitter coordinates of one or more transmit elements making up a transmit aperture;

    retrieving a second data set from a second non-volatile digital memory device with the computing system, the second data set comprising a first series of ultrasound echo strings produced by the transmit aperture, each ultrasound echo string of the first series comprising a plurality of echo samples received by one of a plurality of receive elements of a first receive aperture;

    retrieving a third data set from the first non-volatile digital memory device with the computing system, the third data set comprising data describing coordinates of each of the plurality of elements of the first receive aperture relative to a common coordinate system with the first transmitter coordinates;

    retrieving a fourth data set from the second non-volatile digital memory device with the computing system, the fourth data set comprising a second series of ultrasound echo strings produced by the transmit aperture, each ultrasound echo string of the second series comprising a plurality of echo samples received by one of a plurality of receive elements of a second receive aperture;

    retrieving a fifth data set from the first non-volatile digital memory device with the computing system, the fifth data set comprising data describing coordinates of each of the plurality of elements of the first receive aperture relative to the common coordinate system;

    obtaining a transmit location of the transmit aperture from the first data set in the computing system;

    obtaining receive element coordinates for each of the plurality of elements of the first receive aperture from the second data set in the computing system;

    obtaining receive element coordinates for each of the plurality of elements of the second receive aperture from the fifth data set in the computing system;

    receiving, from a user input device, user input defining a first set of beamforming parameters, at least one parameter of the first set of beamforming parameters having a value different than a value used during an imaging session in which the second and fourth data was captured;

    beamforming, with a beamfon ling processor, the second data set to determine a pixel display location for each echo sample in each echo string of the first series of ultrasound echo strings using the first set of beamforming parameters, the transmit location, and the receive element coordinates for each of the plurality of receive elements of the first receive aperture to determine trigonometric relationships between the transmit aperture, reflectors, and the receive elements of the first receive aperture and the receive elements of the second receive aperture to produce a first set of complete two-dimensional sub-images of a target object in the computing system;

    combining, with an image layer combining processor, the first set of complete two-dimensional sub-images of the target object to form a first combined image;

    beamforming, with the beamforming processor, the fourth data set to determine a pixel display location for each echo sample in each echo string of the second series of ultrasound echo strings using the first set of beamforming parameters, the transmit location, and the receive element coordinates for each of the plurality of receive elements of the second receive aperture to determine trigonometric relationships between the transmit aperture, reflectors, and the receive elements of the first receive aperture and the receive elements of the second receive aperture to produce a second set of complete two-dimensional images of the target object in the computing system;

    combining, with the image layer combining processor, the second set of complete two-dimensional sub-images of the target object to form a second combined image;

    combining, with the image layer combining processor, the first combined image and the second combined image to form a third combined image of the target object; and

    displaying the third combined image of the target object on a display.

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