Ultrasonic imaging apparatus and method
AssigneeHitachi Medical Corporation
InventorsTakashi Azuma, Shin-ichiro Umemura, Yuichi Miwa
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An ultrasonic imaging apparatus and method combines dynamically focused reception and coded transmission/reception technologies by inexpensive circuitry. A receive aperture is divided into smaller apertures. Correspondingly, a receive beam former is divided into receive sub-beam formers 36a to 36n by which a phase alignment and summing process is performed. Thereafter, coded signals are compressed in decoders 37a to 37n in a time axis direction. Output signals from the decoders are once again subjected to a phase alignment and summing process in a second beam former.
Claims9
An ultrasonic imaging apparatus comprising:
- an ultrasonic probe having a plurality of oscillators and an aperture for transmitting and receiving an ultrasonic wave;
- a transmit signal processing circuit for producing a coded signal for driving the ultrasonic probe, the coded signal being expanded in a time axis direction;
- a receive sub-aperture selection switch for dividing receive signals from the individual oscillators of the ultrasonic probe into a plurality of groups;
- a plurality of receive beam formers for beamforming a plurality of receive signals outputted from a plurality of oscillators belonging to each of the groups;
- and
- a decoding receive beam former for compressing, in a time axis direction, a plurality of receive code-sequence signal waveforms outputted from the plurality of receive beam formers and summing the compressed signals while controlling delay time among the signals.
An ultrasonic imaging method comprising the steps of:
- transmitting a beam of ultrasonic waves coded by a code sequence emitted by an ultrasonic probe having a plurality of oscillators and an aperture for transmitting and receiving an ultrasonic wave;
- producing a plurality of beamformed signals by dividing the plurality of oscillators of the ultrasonic probe into a plurality of groups and beamforming a plurality of receive signals outputted by a plurality of oscillators belonging to each of the groups;
- and
- compressing the plurality of beamformed signals in a time axis direction and summing the compressed signals while controlling the delay time among the signals.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.