Diasonics Ultrasound, Inc.

Diasonics, Inc.

Other

Aliphcom

Steven F Forestieri

Ray S Spratt

Gregory C Burnett

Zhinian Jing

Thomas Alan Donaldson

Nicolas Jean Petit

Michael Goertz

Gregory Sharat Lin

John J Lum

William A Rains

Steven A McNerney

Sandra A Briggs

Sheng T Lin

A wireless conference call telephone system uses body-worn wired or wireless audio endpoints comprising microphones and, optionally, speakers. These audio-endpoints, which include headsets, pendants, and clip-on microphones to name a few, are used to capture the user's voice and the resulting data may be used to remove echo and environmental acoustic noise. Each audio-endpoint transmits its audio to the telephony gateway, where noise and echo suppression can take place if not already performed on the audio-endpoint, and where each audio-endpoint's output can be labeled, integrated with the output of other audio-endpoints, and transmitted over one or more telephony channels of a telephone network. The noise and echo suppression can also be done on the audio-endpoint. The labeling of each user's output can be used by the outside caller's phone to spatially locate each user in space, increasing intelligibility.

Wireless conference call telephone

A wireless conference call telephone system uses body-worn wired or wireless audio endpoints comprising microphone arrays and, optionally, speakers. These audio-endpoints, which include headsets, pendants, and clip-on microphones to name a few, are used to capture the user's voice and the resulting data may be used to remove echo and environmental acoustic noise. Each audio-endpoint transmits its audio to the telephony gateway, where noise and echo suppression can take place if not already performed on the audio-endpoint, and where each audio-endpoint's output can be labeled, integrated with the output of other audio-endpoints, and transmitted over one or more telephony channels of a telephone network. The noise and echo suppression can also be done on the audio-endpoint. The labeling of each user's output can be used by the outside caller's phone to spatially locate each user in space, increasing intelligibility.

A method and apparatus for determining resistance and pulsatility indices of a flow of material, such as the flow of blood in the human body. This may be implemented, for example, in a color flow module in an ultrasonic imaging system for display of the pulsatility or resistance index in two dimensions and in different colors to allow discrimination between veins and arteries and detection of pathologic elevation of vascular resistance in a clinical survey mode of the system. The resistance index is determined from the ratio of a unipolar variation estimate of a velocity of the flow material divided by a peak velocity. The variation estimate may be one of the following: a difference between a peak velocity of the flow of material and a second minimum (if unipolar) or negative (if bipolar) velocity of the flow of material, a standard deviation .rho. of the velocity of the flow of material, a square root of a value at a first peak of an autocorrelator of the velocity of the flow of material, and a square root of a value at a second peak of the autocorrelator of the velocity of the flow of material.

Real-time two-dimensional resistance and pulsatility mapping

A method and apparatus for displaying an image representing the flow of a substance in a scanned area. An Angio scanner scans a region of tissue and generates Ultrasound Angio data representing the flow of blood in the region of tissue. Relatively small blood flows are difficult to detect in images based solely on Angio data. To enhance the visibility of small blood flows, spatial derivative values are calculated from the Angio data. A fraction of the original Angio data plus a bias is summed with the spatial derivative values to generate composite values. An image of the scanned region is displayed with colors or grayscale shades based on the composite values. The resulting image depicts blood vessels in an edge-enhanced format, giving a three-dimensional appearance.

Method and apparatus for displaying angiographic data in a topographic

A method and apparatus of processing signals in an ultrasonic imaging system for imaging a living subject. The ultrasonic imaging system including an ultrasonic emitter, receptor and display. N temporally-spaced signals from ultrasound produced by a plurality of temporally-spaced referenced pulses are obtained and the amplitude (power) of each of the N temporally-spaced signals is determined. In various embodiments, N is an odd integer, usually, 1, 3, 5 or 7, depending on a user-setting. A median temporal signal of the N amplitude signals is then obtained. In implemented embodiments, the median is obtained by sorting a list of the N amplitude signals until (N+1)/2 signals have been sorted. The median is temporally filtered with a previous signal displayed on the display of the ultrasonic imaging system, wherein the temporal filtering including a filtering coefficient having a magnitude approximating a cardiac cycle of the living subject. Such processing is especially useful for angiography studies, wherein artifacts are removed providing a higher-quality image than in the prior art.

Median temporal filtering of ultrasonic data

Method and apparatus for performing angiography of a subject under examination in an ultrasonic imaging apparatus. A set of ultrasonic reference pulses along each of a series of parallel vectors is emitted into the subject under examination, echoes are received, and a plurality of data samples are obtained. From each of the plurality of data samples a plurality of basis functions are removed to remove clutter and generate a plurality of processed samples. The processed samples are averaged and temporally filtered with signals displayed in a previous time period to generate a second averaged signals. The temporal filtering is performed using a filter coefficient which approximates a full cardiac cycle of the subject under examination. Each of the second plurality of signals is converted to a color value to generate a first plurality of color values within a range of color values from the first color value to a second color value, wherein the first color value represents a minimum amplitude of the third plurality of signals to be displayed and the second color value represents a maximum amplitude of the second plurality of signals to be displayed. The first plurality of color values is displayed on the display at positions on the display corresponding with the points (color sample volumes) along each of the series of parallel vectors in the subject.

Angiography using ultrasound

An apparatus for temporal filtering in an ultrasonic imaging system. The apparatus has a means for storing previous imaging information from a previous time period and a means for storing current imaging information from a current time period. Means for determining the larger of the current and previous imaging information is provided and a means is provided for generating an alpha value responsive to the larger information. The alpha value ranges between a minimum and maximum values and has the maximum value when the larger information has a large frequency and has the minimum value when the larger information has a small frequency. Means for generating output imaging information is provided, the output imaging information generated by multiplying the current imaging information by alpha and summing it with the product of the maximum value minus alpha and the previous imaging information. The apparatus provides a means for heavily averaging the imaging information for small frequencies of the larger information and maintaining the pulsatility of large frequencies for fast moving blood velocities. In the preferred embodiment, errors and noise are minimized at frequencies near the baseline, and frequencies near Nyquist are not averaged at all. In one embodiment the apparatus comprises a lookup table.

Temporal filtering of color doppler signal data

An apparatus and method for clutter elimination from signals which digitizes a signal to generate n samples of the signals. M basis functions (such as various levels of filters) are fit to the n samples. An i+1 basis function of the m basis functions is iteratively subtracted from each of the n samples, and the difference is stored in an i difference signal until the i+1 difference signal is less than a threshold. In various embodiments, the threshold may be an absolute noise floor (R.sub.O.sup.min) preset by a manufacturer or a user. In other embodiments, the threshold may be based upon an absolute or relative predictor error of the signal once the basis function (filter) has been removed. The i difference signal may be used for performing a frequency estimate of the signal.

Automatic clutter elimination

Signal processing apparatus and methods for elimination of undesirable clutter signals from desirable signals. This is performed without the use of filters by subtracting orthonormal basis functions from signal samples until the appropriate degree of clutter removal is achieved. Estimates of frequency information such as Doppler shifts due to fluid flow may thus be achieved with superior discrimination of true flow signals from sources of clutter or artifact, greater sensitivity to low flow rates, minimal computational effort and with fewer samples than the prior art.

Parametric clutter elimination

An apparatus and method for displaying ultrasonic data in real time reflected in a living organism. The apparatus comprises a plurality of analog-to-digital converters for digitizing reflected Doppler signals produced by reflecting a reference pulsed acoustic signal, each of the analog-to-digital converters capable of producing a plurality of digitized Doppler signals. The apparatus futher comprises a plurality of digital signal processors, each of the plurality of digital signal processors coupled to each of the plurality of analog-to-digital converters for processing digitized Doppler signals received from the analog-to-digital converters, each of the digital signal processors capable of producing a plurality of processed digital signals. The apparatus further comprises a controller coupled to the analog-to-digital converters and the digital signal processors for controlling the operation of the analog-to-digital converters and digital signal processors, controlling the receipt of the processed digital signals, and compressing each of the plurality of processed digital signals output from the plurality of digital signal processors into a plurality of signals suitable for display.

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Santa Clara, CA, United States of America

Steven F Forestieri