Koninklijke Philips Corporation N.v.

Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd.

University of Washington

Jing-Ming Jong

Paul Ross Detmer

James Robertson Jago

Robert Randall Entrekin

Lars Jonas Olsson

Yangmo Yoo

Martin Anderson

Yongmin Kim

Vincentius Paulus Buil

Xiang-Ning Li

Alasdair Dow

Thomas Alexander

Kil-Su Eo

Hyunwook Park

An ultrasonic diagnostic imaging system and method are presented in which the balance between image resolution and frame rate (Res/Speed) and the balance between image resolution and penetration (Pen/Gen/Res) are automatically adjusted in response to image content. A motion detector analyzes the relative motion between successive images. If the motion content is relatively high, the imaging parameters are changed in favor of relatively greater frame rate and reduced resolution. A low motion content causes the opposite adjustment. The electronic noise between successive images is also computed with a relatively high noise content (low correlation) in the far field resulting in an adjustment to penetration as by lowering the transmit frequency. A relatively low noise content causes an adjustment in favor of increased resolution.

Ultrasonic diagnostic imaging system with automatic control of penetration, resolution and frame rate

An ultrasonic diagnostic imaging system produces an extended field of view (EFOV) image. A 3D imaging probe is moved along the skin of a patient above the anatomy which is to be included in the EFOV image. As the probe is moved, images are acquired from a plurality of differently oriented image planes such as a sagittal plane and a transverse plane. As the probe is moved the image data of successive planes of one of the orientations is compared to estimate the motion of the probe. These motion estimates are used to position a succession of images acquired in one of the orientations accurately with respect to each other in an EFOV display format. The motion estimates are also used to display a graphic on the display screen which indicates the progress of the scan to the user as the probe is being moved. The progress may be indicated in terms of probe velocity, distance traveled, or the path traversed by the moving probe.

Extended field of view ultrasonic imaging with guided EFOV scanning

An ultrasonic diagnostic imaging system produces an extended field of view (EFOV) image. A 3D imaging probe is moved along the skin of a patient above the anatomy which is to be included in the EFOV image. As the probe is moved, images are acquired from a plurality of differently oriented image planes such as a sagittal plane and a transverse plane. As the probe is moved the image data of successive planes of one of the orientations is compared to estimate the motion of the probe. These motion estimates are used to position a succession of images acquired in one of the orientations accurately with respect to each other in an EFOV display format. The display format may be either a 2D EFOV image or a 3D EFOV image.

Extended field of view ultrasonic imaging with a two dimensional array probe

Three dimensional ultrasonic images are formed by volume rendering using a 3D ultrasonic image data set. The data set may be acquired by rocking, sweeping, fanning or rotating a 2D image plane through the volume being scanned, or by steering beams in different angular directions from a two dimensional array of transducer elements. The polar data is volume rendered to form a 3D image by means of projected raylines which are warped to account for the angular geometry of the acquisition.

Volume rendered three dimensional ultrasonic images with polar coordinates

A 3-D ultrasound imaging system acquires partially complete image volumes interspersed with substantially complete image volumes. The partially complete image volumes contain speckle that is processed by a cross-correlation algorithm to track the movement of an ultrasound scanhead. By tracking the movement of the scanhead, the substantially complete image volumes can be properly registered with each other and combined to create a 3-D extended field of view image. The partially complete image volumes contain significantly less data than the substantially complete image volumes. Therefore, the partially complete image volumes can be acquired more quickly than the substantially complete image volumes to allow the scanhead to be scanned at a relatively fast speed.

High frame rate extended field of view ultrasound imaging system and method

Position sensor in ultrasound transducer probe

The present invention provides a unified image and graphics processing system that provides both image and graphics processing at high speeds. The system includes a parallel vector processing unit, a graphics subsystem, a shared memory and a set of high-speed data buses for connecting all of the other components. Generally, the parallel vector processing unit includes a series of vector processors. Each processor includes a vector address generator for efficient generation of memory addresses for regular address sequences. In order to synchronize and control the vector processors' accesses to shared memory, the parallel vector processing unit includes shared memory access logic. The logic is incorporated into each vector processor. The graphics subsystem includes a series of polygon processors in a pipelined configuration. Each processor is connected in the pipeline by a first-in-first-out (FIFO) buffer for passing data results. Additionally, each polygon processor is connected to a local shared memory in which program instructions and data are stored. The graphics subsystem also includes a device addressing mechanism for identifying a destination device using a tagged address. The shared memory, the parallel vector processor and the graphics subsystem also incorporate an abbreviated addressing scheme, which reduces the amount of information required to request sequential addresses from the shared memory.

Imaging and graphics processing system

Growing community of inventors

Seattle, WA, United States of America

Jing-Ming Jong