High-speed ultrasound volumetric imaging system. II. Parallel processing and image display

Abstract

For pt.I see ibid., vol.38, no.2, p.100-8 (1991). The authors describe the design, application, and evaluation of parallel processing to the high-speed volumetric ultrasound imaging system. The scanner produces images analogous to an optical camera or the human eye and supplies more information than conventional sonograms. Potential medical applications include improved anatomic visualization, tumor localization, and better assessment of cardiac function. The system uses pulse-echo phased array principles to steer a 2-D array transducer of 289 elements in a pyramidal scan format. Parallel processing in the receive mode produces 4992 scan lines at a rate of approximately 8 frames/s. Echo data for the scanned volume is presented online as projection images with depth perspective, stereoscopic pairs, or multiple tomographic images. The authors also describe the techniques developed for the online display of volumetric images on a conventional CRT oscilloscope and show preliminary volumetric images for each display mode.

Finite-element analysis of temperature rise and lesion formation from catheter ultrasound ablation transducers

“…Our goal is integrated real-time three-dimensional (3-D) ultrasound imaging [10], [11] and ultrasound ablation in the same intracardiac catheter (Fig. 1).…”

C-Mode Real-time Tomographic Reflection for a Matrix Array Ultrasound Sonic Flashlight1

“…In particular, we have chosen Real Time 3D (RT3D) ultrasound, which has been available commercially since the mid 1990's through Volumetrics Medical Imaging, Inc., a spin-off from Duke University, where we participated in development of the technology. 7,8 Volumetrics sold fewer than 25 scanners in the United States and abroad. The particular scanner that we used for the C-mode sonic flashlight was known as "T4", the prototype for the commercialized scanners.…”

Filter-based coded-excitation system for high-speed ultrasonic imaging

“…The number of receive beams determines the number of image lines to be acquired simultaneously. A particular imaging system based on this approach was developed by von Ramm et al [26], [34], [35]. According to a recent report [34], their third-generation volumetric imaging system can create 16 parallel receive beams and scan a 65° × 65° pyramidal volume (with maximum imaging depth 15 cm) at the rate of 20 fps.…”

“…Basically, two approaches have been proposed and investigated for realizing parallel image line processing. One approach is to modify the beam former so that it creates a limited number of receive beams surrounding a main beam direction [22], [26], [31], [35]. The number of receive beams determines the number of image lines to be acquired simultaneously.…”

“…Recent progress in transducer fabrication and very-large-scale integration signal processing have motivated several research groups to pursue high-speed ultrasound pulse-echo imaging systems capable of parallel processing multiple image lines for real-time 3-D imaging applications [3], [18], [23], [24], [26], [31], [33], [35]. Basically, two approaches have been proposed and investigated for realizing parallel image line processing.…”