The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Mar. 05, 2013
Filed:
Aug. 28, 2008
Shinichiro Umemura, Sendai, JP;
Takashi Azuma, Sagamihara, JP;
Shinichiro Umemura, Sendai, JP;
Takashi Azuma, Sagamihara, JP;
Hitachi Medical Corporation, Tokyo, JP;
Abstract
An echo signal reflected from a microbubble contrast agent is discriminated from an echo signal generated upon reflection of a nonlinearly propagated transmission pulse from the body tissues without degradation of the axial resolution, by performing transmission/reception twice or less which would hardly decrease the imaging speed. By detecting a difference in phase of the second harmonic component based on the fundamental component included in the echo signal, an echo signal generated upon nonlinear reflection from a microbubble contrast agent is discriminated from an echo signal generated upon linear reflection of a nonlinearly propagated transmission pulse from the body tissues. The phase of the second harmonic component is detected through phase sensitive detection in which the square of the fundamental component is used as a reference wave. Concurrently, a pulse inversion method is used to extract the second harmonic component included in the original echo signal, whereby degradation of the axial resolution is prevented.