An Integrated Programmable High-Voltage Bipolar Pulser With Embedded Transmit/Receive Switch for Miniature Ultrasound Probes

Tan, Mingliang; Kang, Ey Goo; An, Jinyoung; Chang, Zu-yao; Vince, Philippe; Senegond, Nicolas; Pertijs, Michiel A. P.

doi:10.1109/esscirc.2019.8902876

Cited by 6 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 8 publications

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“…A very important trade-off with probe-integrated electronics is that the series resistance of the high voltage switches can be made larger than the typical ultrasound system (e.g., 50 Ω ) due to the fact that the small 2D elements themselves have high impedance. This fact has made possible very high-density and high functionality switching matrix implementations [ 16 , 33 , 38 , 42 , 47 , 50 ] which were not previously possible when very large low resistance high voltages switches were used. R in in the Verasonics can be set to a higher level which is one way to attempt to help match the system electronics to the high impedance elements.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This charges up the parasitic gate-source capacitance of the switch devices to V gs (ON) = +HV. At the end of the charging period, CLK_H = 0 V, and the current mirror devices are turned off which stops the flow of current into the gate-source capacitance and also allows the control node to float, similar in operation to DRAM [ 7 , 46 , 47 ]. In practice, leakage currents at the gates of the switch devices will discharge the gate capacitance over time and charge-injection causes V gs to decrease slightly ( Figure 8 ).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Highly Integrated Multiplexing and Buffering Electronics for Large Aperture Ultrasonic Arrays

Wodnicki

Kang

et al. 2022

BME Front

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Large aperture ultrasonic arrays can be implemented by tiling together multiple pretested modules of high-density acoustic arrays with closely integrated multiplexing and buffering electronics to form a larger aperture with high yield. These modular arrays can be used to implement large 1.75D array apertures capable of focusing in elevation for uniform slice thickness along the axial direction which can improve image contrast. An important goal for large array tiling is obtaining high yield and sensitivity while reducing extraneous image artifacts. We have been developing tileable acoustic-electric modules for the implementation of large array apertures utilizing Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs) implemented using 0.35 μm high voltage (50 V) CMOS. Multiple generations of ASICs have been designed and tested. The ASICs were integrated with high-density transducer arrays for acoustic testing and imaging. The modules were further interfaced to a Verasonics Vantage imaging system and were used to image industry standard ultrasound phantoms. The first-generation modules comprise ASICs with both multiplexing and buffering electronics on-chip and have demonstrated a switching artifact which was visible in the images. A second-generation ASIC design incorporates low switching injection circuits which effectively mitigate the artifacts observed with the first-generation devices. Here, we present the architecture of the two ASIC designs and module types as well imaging results that demonstrate reduction in switching artifacts for the second-generation devices.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Highly Integrated Multiplexing and Buffering Electronics for Large Aperture Ultrasonic Arrays

Wodnicki

Kang

et al. 2022

BME Front

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“…11 can only produce unipolar pulses, rendering it inapplicable to ultrasound systems that require bipolar pulses. However, by arranging multiple level shifters and output stages, it is possible to generate bipolar pulses as evidenced in [71], [80]- [84]. The design in [71] is elaborated here to explain how bipolar, return-to-zero pulses can be generated with the help of conventional level shifters and a novel high-voltage output stage.…”

Section: B Square Wave Pulsers 1) Level Shiftermentioning

confidence: 99%

Integrated Circuits for Medical Ultrasound Applications: Imaging and Beyond

Zhang

Demosthenous²

2021

IEEE Trans. Biomed. Circuits Syst.

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Medical ultrasound has become a crucial part of modern society and continues to play a vital role in the diagnosis and treatment of illnesses. Over the past decades, the development of medical ultrasound has seen extraordinary progress as a result of the tremendous research advances in microelectronics, transducer technology and signal processing algorithms. However, medical ultrasound still faces many challenges including powerefficient driving of transducers, low-noise recording of ultrasound echoes, effective beamforming in a non-linear, high-attenuation medium (human tissues) and reduced overall form factor. This paper provides a comprehensive review of the design of integrated circuits for medical ultrasound applications. The most important and ubiquitous modules in a medical ultrasound system are addressed, i) transducer driving circuit, ii) low-noise amplifier, iii) beamforming circuit and iv) analog-digital converter. Within each ultrasound module, some representative research highlights are described followed by a comparison of the state-of-the-art. This paper concludes with a discussion and recommendations for future research directions.

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“…In addition to the above methods, integrating ultrasound transducer with front-end circuits is an efficient way to enhance the signal [25][26][27]. Array / Matrix transducer with custom application-specified integrated circuits (ASIC) has been previously demonstrated in ultrasound imaging [28][29][30]. For example, a 2D array transducer with integrated ASIC in a 10 Fr catheter was developed for real-time 3D intracardiac echocardiography [31].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A High Sensitivity 20-MHz Endoscopic Transducer With Integrated Miniature Amplifier

Han

Yang

et al. 2020

IEEE Access

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Endoscopic transducer with small size and high frequency has been widely studied and applied in medical ultrasound imaging. However, attenuation affects high frequency ultrasound waves to a greater degree than lower frequency waves, which results in limited endoscopic ultrasound detection depth and poor signal-to-noise ratio in the image. High sensitivity transducer is an effective way to improve this problem. In this paper, a high sensitivity endoscopic ultrasound transducer (HSEUST) with an integrated miniature amplifier was proposed, where the amplifier can effectively enhance the received ultrasound signal and reduce the impact of noise. According to the tests and experimental results, this sensor is about 4 times more in sensitive, 20% more in resolution than conventional endoscopic transducer. With high sensitivity, this transducer holds the potential for visualization of deeper tissue in the body with high resolution, which will greatly expand the application capabilities and fields of endoscope ultrasound imaging.

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An Integrated Programmable High-Voltage Bipolar Pulser With Embedded Transmit/Receive Switch for Miniature Ultrasound Probes

Cited by 6 publications

References 8 publications

Highly Integrated Multiplexing and Buffering Electronics for Large Aperture Ultrasonic Arrays

Highly Integrated Multiplexing and Buffering Electronics for Large Aperture Ultrasonic Arrays

Integrated Circuits for Medical Ultrasound Applications: Imaging and Beyond

A High Sensitivity 20-MHz Endoscopic Transducer With Integrated Miniature Amplifier

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