US 2020/0205773 A1Published application

Ultrasound imaging system

AssigneeUltraDiagnostics, Inc.

InventorsKullervo Hynynen, Anna Kristoffersen, Tyler Portelli

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Abstract

An ultrasound imaging system for imaging soft tissue through bone matter of a subject. The imaging system transmits ultrasound waves via an ultrasound probe toward the subject's bone material at a plurality of incidence angles so that ultrasound waves may pass through and reflect back through bone as both longitudinal and shear waves, which are all used in combination for imaging. The system includes a switch to connect the transducer elements to a commercially available ultrasound driving system, which allow the imaging system to utilize an ultrasound driving system which has fewer electrical transmit/receive channels than the ultrasound probe. The host controller processes the received ultrasound signals to form an image of the subject's soft tissue through matter. The image reconstruction method, along with tracking information, allows the creation of whole-brain two-dimensional, 2D orthogonal, or three-dimensional images, as well as time lapse four-dimensional or tomographical ultrasound images.

Claims61

Dependent claims

An ultrasound imaging system comprising:

an ultrasound transducer probe includes a face configured to contact a subject, the face including an array of transducer elements, the array of transducer elements includes at least one first transmit pad that includes at least one first active transducer element, at least one second transmit pad that includes at least one second active transducer element, and at least one receive pad, wherein the at least one first active transducer element is capable of transmitting longitudinal ultrasound waves at a first incident angle with respect to a bone of the subject so that waves may propagate through the bone as shear waves and wherein the at least one second active transducer element is capable of transmitting longitudinal ultrasound waves at a second incident angle with respect to the bone so that the waves may propagate through the bone as longitudinal waves;
a host controller;
an ultrasound driving system;
an ultrasound transducer probe;
an ultrasound system switch that connects the ultrasound driving system to the ultrasound transducer probe, wherein the host controller controls operation of the ultrasound transducer probe via the ultrasound driving system;
wherein the host controller commands the ultrasound driving system to generate radio frequency (RF) signals that are used by the transducer probe to generate ultrasound waves;
wherein upon receipt of commands from host controller, the ultrasound driving system causes the ultrasound transducer probe to generate ultrasound waves at the first incident angle and at the second incident angle;
wherein the ultrasound driving system captures electronic signals produced by ultrasound waves received by the at least one receive pad of the ultrasound transducer probe via the ultrasound system switch and digitizes the received electronic signals;
and
wherein the host controller forms an image of the subject based on the digitized received electronic signals.

7 more elements

An ultrasound imaging method comprising:

transmitting longitudinal ultrasound waves via an ultrasound probe toward a target at a plurality of incident angles, wherein at least a first incident angle is below a longitudinal wave critical angle and wherein at a second incident angles is above the longitudinal wave critical angle and below a shear wave critical angle;
receiving reflected longitudinal ultrasound waves via the ultrasound probe;
producing received radio frequency (RF) signals via the ultrasound probe based on the received reflected longitudinal ultrasound waves;
receiving backscattered longitudinal ultrasound waves via the ultrasound probe;
producing received RF signals via the ultrasound probe based on the received backscattered longitudinal ultrasound waves;
digitizing the received RF signals to form digitized RF signals;
and
processing the digitized RF signals to form an image of the target.

5 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.