General Electric Company

Manuel Schoenauer

Reinhold Bruestle

Thomas Rittenschober

Andreas Kremsl

David A Chartrand

Scott William Easterbrook

Rainer Schröder

Systems are provided for the arrangement of decoupled electric and acoustic modules for a transducer array of an ultrasound probe. In one embodiment, the decoupled modules are independently coupled to a flex interconnect, apart from one another, allowing for electric communication between all modules through the flex interconnect. As one example, an ultrasound transducer array for an ultrasound probe comprises an acoustic backing, a flex interconnect coupled to the backing at a first surface of the flex interconnect, a matrix acoustic array coupled to a second surface of the flex interconnect, the second surface opposite the first surface, and an electric module coupled to the second surface of the flex interconnect at a location spaced away from where the matrix acoustic array is coupled to the flex interconnect.

Ultrasound transducer array with separated acoustic and electric module

An ultrasound probe and method of forming an ultrasound probe are provided. The ultrasound probe comprises a two-dimensional (2D) transducer assembly having transducer elements arranged in rows and columns. The transducer elements have front and rear surfaces. The front surface is configured to transmit and receive ultrasound signals to and from an object of interest. A thin film flex circuit extends along the rear surface of the transducer assembly. The flex circuit has conductive traces arranged in layers and enclosed within a common dielectric layer. The dielectric layer has a homogeneous composition surrounding the layers of the conductive traces. The conductive traces are electrically interconnected to the corresponding transducer elements.

Ultrasound probe with thin film flex circuit and methods of providing same

Methods and systems for connection to a transducer in ultrasound probes are provided. One system includes transducer having a base configured to support thereon an ultrasound transducer array and a plurality of electrical interconnects integrated with the base. The electrical interconnects are configured to connect to the ultrasound transducer array and extend along at least a portion of the base from the ultrasound transducer array.

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Zipf, Austria

Manuel Schoenauer