Coded excitation for synthetic aperture ultrasound imaging

Peak acoustic power limits the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of real-time ultrasound images. For most conventional scan formats, however, the average power is well below heating limits. This means the SNR can be significantly increased using coded excitation. A coded system transmits a broadband, temporally elongated excitation pulse with a finite time-bandwidth product. The received signal must be decoded to produce an imaging pulse with improved SNR resulting from the higher average power in the elongated excitation. Decoding can produce significant range side lobes, however, greatly reducing image quality. All practical coding designs, therefore, represent a trade-off between SNR gain and range side lobes. A specific coding scheme appropriate for synthetic aperture imaging is presented. A 14.5 dB SNR improvement with acceptable range side lobes is demonstrated on a forward-looking imaging system appropriate for intravascular applications.     

Coded pulse excitation for ultrasonic strain imaging

Decorrelation strain noise can be significantly reduced in low echo-signal-to-noise (eSNR) conditions using coded excitation. Large time-bandwidth-product (>30) pulses are transmitted into tissue mimicking phantoms with 2.5-mm diameter inclusions that mimic the elastic properties of breast lesions. We observed a 5-10 dB improvement in eSNR that led to a doubling of the depth of focus for strain images with no reduction of spatial resolution. In high eSNR conditions, coded excitation permits the use of higher carrier frequencies and shorter correlation windows to improve the attainable spatial resolution for strain relative to that obtained with conventional short pulses. This paper summarizes comparative studies of strain imaging in noise-limited conditions obtained by short pulses and four common aperiodic codes (chirp, Barker, suboptimal, and Golay) as a function of attenuation, eSNR and applied strain. Imaging performance is quantified using SNR for displacement (SNRd), local modulation transfer function (LMTF), and contrast-to-noise ratio for strain (CNRepsilon). We found that chirp and Golay codes are the most robust for imaging soft tissue deformation using matched filter decoding. Their superior performance is obtained by balancing the need for low-range lobes, large eSNR improvement, and short-code duration.     

Coded excitation for diagnostic ultrasound: a system developer's perspective

Resolution and penetration are primary criteria for clinical image quality. Conventionally, high bandwidth for resolution was achieved with a short pulse, which results in a tradeoff between resolution and penetration. Coded excitation extends the bounds of this tradeoff by increasing signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) through appropriate coding on transmit and decoding on receive. Although used for about 50 years in radar, coded excitation was successfully introduced into commercial ultrasound scanners only within the last 5 years. This delay is at least partly due to practical implementation issues particular to diagnostic ultrasound, which are the focus of this paper. After reviewing the basics of biphase and chirp coding, we present simulation results to quantify tradeoffs between penetration and resolution under frequency-dependent attenuation, dynamic focusing, and nonlinear propagation. Next we compare chirp and Golay code performance with respect to image quality and system requirements, then we show clinical images that illustrate the current applications of coded excitation in B-mode, harmonic, and flow imaging.     

Coded excitation with spectrum inversion (CEXSI) for ultrasound array imaging

In this paper, a scheme called coded excitation with spectrum inversion (CEXSI) is presented. An established optimal binary code whose spectrum has no s and possesses the least variation is encoded as a burst for transmission. Using this optimal code, the decoding filter can be derived directly from its inverse spectrum. Various transmission techniques can be used to improve energy coupling within the system pass-band. We demonstrate its potential to achieve excellent decoding with very low (<80 dB) side-lobes. For a 2.6 /spl mu/s code, an array element with a center frequency of 10 MHz and fractional bandwidth of 38%, range side-lobes of about 40 dB have been achieved experimentally with little compromise in range resolution. The signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) improvement also has been characterized at about 14 dB. Along with simulations and experimental data, we present a formulation of the scheme, according to which CEXSI can be extended to improve SNR in sparse array imaging in general.     

相控阵ADCP编码信号相移波束形成

相对于活塞式声学多普勒流速剖面仪,相控阵声学多普勒流速剖面仪的换能器体积大大缩小,并且依托相控阵本身的物理特性,无需进行声速补偿。利用窄带相控阵声学多普勒流速剖面仪系统进行编码信号的发射与接收,从而提高相控阵声学多普勒流速剖面仪的设备性能。首先介绍了相控阵ADCP的波束形成方法,然后分别介绍了相控阵的相移波束形成和时延波束形成原理,对编码信号相移相控波束形成情况下,相控阵发射和接收信号波束开角进行了对比,并对作用距离、测量精度、系统复杂度等系统性能进行了分析。分析结果表明:窄带相控阵声学多普勒流速剖面仪可以进行编码信号的发射和接收,能够提高系统的空间分辨率和测量精度,从而提高相控阵声学多普勒流速剖面仪的性能。     

Large-area, real-time imaging system for surface acoustic wavedevices

A system for imaging the particle displacement envelope of vibrational (transverse) modes of surface acoustic wave (SAW) devices is described. The modes are being imaged using a schlieren method for visualizing the acoustic power flow with a beam-expanded helium-neon (HeNe) laser. The optical arrangement uses internal reflection from within the quartz substrate to achieve high-efficiency acousto-optic diffraction of the laser light. The use of a CCD camera coupled with a frame grabber and a computer with image calculator software establishes an imaging system for large-area, real-time visualization, recording, accurate measurement, and analysis of vibrational modes of SAW devices. These methods are part of an effort to determine the relationship between acceleration sensitivity and transverse variations in the acoustic-mode shape in SAW resonators. Use of the system in imaging a 98 MHz SAW device is presented as an example     

A new system for real-time synthetic aperture ultrasonic imaging

The authors devised a way to generate in real time a cross-sectional image of an object with uniformly high resolution based on the synthetic aperture focusing technique (SAFT). A computer simulation was conducted to study the effects of essential parameters on the resulting images. An imaging system was built that produces a cross-sectional image composed of an assembly of line images of depth direction, i.e. processed A-scan images, and displays a scroll picture on a CRT (cathode ray tube) with no interruption regardless of the object size. It takes only 3 ms from the start of transmission of the ultrasonic wave to the completion of a line image reconstruction, and the framed image on a CRT is updated at the TV rate of 1/30 s. Imaging experiments were conducted using the system, and its expected performance was demonstrated.     

Optical techniques for real-time penetration monitoring for laser welding

Optical techniques for real-time full-penetration monitoring for Nd:YAG laser welding have been investigated. Coaxial light emission from the keyhole is imaged onto three photodiodes and a camera. We describe the spectral and statistical analyses from photodiode signals, which indicate the presence of a full penetration. Two image processing techniques based on the keyhole shape recognition and the keyhole image intensity profile along the welding path are presented. An intensity ratio parameter is used to determine the extent of opening at the rear of a fully opened keyhole. We show that this parameter clearly interprets a hole in formation or a lack of penetration when welding is performed on workpieces with variable thicknesses at constant laser power.     

某低温系统实时故障诊断专家系统的研究与应用

介绍了某低温系统在线故障诊断专家系统,叙述了诊断系统的基本结构及故障监测、预测和故障处理。系统使用delphi开发工具,利用各运行参数之间的逻辑关系作为推理依据,运用经验知识和理论知识相结合作为故障诊断的理论依据,对整个低温系统进行状态监测和故障诊断,指导操作人员排除故障。     

MPEG compression of ultrasound RF channel data for a real-time software-based imaging system

Using software for beamforming in ultrasound systems provides high flexibility, and the large number of computations required in a software-based system can be performed in real time on a PC. However, the very large data transfer rate required from the ultrasound front-end to the PC host for real-time operation is a bottleneck which cannot be overcome without appropriate compression. Previous studies have examined JPEG compression of ultrasound RF channel data, but the schemes do not exploit temporal redundancy between adjacent frames. This study utilized MPEG technology to process the ultrasound RF data to increase the compression efficiency. Our results indicate that MPEG compression generally provides a better compression ratio than does JPEG compression. As an example, the compression ratio of MPEG compression in an 8-bit channel A/D data under 5 μm interframe displacement is smaller than 0.13, thus allowing real-time data transfer requirements to be met. Moreover, the compression efficiency for motions in different directions is shown to be highly dependent on the frame-to-frame correlation.     

Optical BEAMTAP beam-forming and jammer-nulling system for broadband phased-array antennas

We present an approach to receive-mode broadband beam forming and jammer nulling for large adaptive antenna arrays as well as its efficient and compact optical implementation. This broadband efficient adaptive method for true-time-delay array processing (BEAMTAP) algorithm decreases the number of tapped delay lines required for processing an N-element phased-array antenna from N to only 2, producing an enormous savings in delay-line hardware (especially for large broadband arrays) while still providing the full NM degrees of freedom of a conventional N-element time-delay-and-sum beam former that requires N tapped delay lines with M taps each. This allows the system to adapt fully and optimally to an arbitrarily complex spatiotemporal signal environment that can contain broadband signals of interest, as well as interference sources and narrow-band and broadband jammers-all of which can arrive from arbitrary angles onto an arbitrarily shaped array-thus enabling a variety of applications in radar, sonar, and communication. This algorithm is an excellent match with the capabilities of radio frequency (rf) photonic systems, as it uses a coherent optically modulated fiber-optic feed network, gratings in a photorefractive crystal as adaptive weights, a traveling-wave detector for generating time delay, and an acousto-optic device to control weight adaptation. Because the number of available adaptive coefficients in a photorefractive crystal is as large as 10(9), these photonic systems can adaptively control arbitrarily large one- or two-dimensional antenna arrays that are well beyond the capabilities of conventional rf and real-time digital signal processing techniques or alternative photonic techniques.     

Theoretical study of a phased-array system using the diffraction model

Abstract

The transformation of a diffusion photon density wave (DPDW) in an infinite homogenous medium with an absorber for a phased-array system is studied theoretically using the diffraction model. The theoretical results agree with the experiment results. The results prove that a small object in a highly scattering medium can be detected and localized precisely by amplitude cancellation phase modulation spectroscopy (PMS).     

三维超声地震模型实时成像系统

室内水槽实验是研究地质沉积过程及其演化规律的重要手段,高精度获取沉积过程中的地质体的变化是这类模拟实验非常关键的环节。文章介绍了新研制的三维超声地震模型实时成像系统的主要组成及关键技术。该系统用于模拟海上地震,可以在沉积实验后通过快速测量及对数据的实时偏移处理与成像可以获取变化的多层复杂地质模型动态图像,极大地提高了实验效率和成像精度。该系统具有良好的实时性、成像质量以及探测范围,在对研究地质沉积、海洋地质以及三维地震模型研究等方面有着广泛应用前景。     

Synthetic-focusing strategies for real-time annular-array imaging

Annular arrays provide a means to achieve enhanced image quality with a limited number of elements. Synthetic-focusing (SF) strategies that rely on beamforming data from individual transmit-to-receive (TR) element pairs provide a means to improve image quality without specialized TR delay electronics. Here, SF strategies are examined in the context of high-frequency ultrasound (>15 MHz) annular arrays composed of five elements, operating at 18 and 38 MHz. Acoustic field simulations are compared with experimental data acquired from wire and anechoic-sphere phantoms, and the values of lateral beamwidth, SNR, contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR), and depth of field (DOF) are compared as a function of depth. In each case, data were acquired for all TR combinations (25 in total) and processed with SF using all 25 TR pairs and SF with the outer receive channels removed one by one. The results show that removing the outer receive channels led to an overall degradation of lateral resolution, an overall decrease in SNR, and did not reduce the DOF, although the DOF profile decreased in amplitude. The CNR was >1 and remained fairly constant as a function of depth, with a slight decrease in CNR for the case with just the central element receiving. The relative changes between the calculated and measured quantities were nearly identical for the 18- and 38-MHz arrays. B-mode images of the anechoic phantom and an in vivo mouse embryo using full SF with 25 TR pairs or reduced TR-pair approaches showed minimal qualitative difference.     

Design and characterization of a real-time angular scatter ultrasound imaging system

A novel ultrasound imaging system has been implemented using two 32-element linear phased array transducers oriented at an angle of 40 degrees to one another. The system simultaneously acquires and displays, in real time, a conventional backscatter image and an angular scatter image formed using side-scattered echoes from the same region. The design of the system is shaped by the influence of the scatter angle on the spatial resolution and receive signal processing requirements of the instrument. The subtended scatter angles are restricted to values >90 degrees to ensure that the angular scatter receiver effectively tracks the transmitted pulse and that the spatial resolution in the two images is comparable. The system is sufficiently tolerant of small variations in the average acoustic velocity of the medium to guarantee reliable pulse tracking in biomedical applications. The angular scatter signal magnitude is significantly weighted by the directivity of the receive array. The imaging system will most effectively demonstrate angular variations in scattering at scatter angles between 125 and 145 degrees , where the angular response of the receiver is near its peak.     

弹体侵彻过程中刚体过载实时提取的滤波方法

针对实测侵彻混凝土数据进行刚体过载提取时,没有明确研究其具体的滤波方法,提出一种适合实时提取刚体过载的滤波方法。根据侵彻加速度信号的特征构造理想侵彻信号,分析常用的巴特沃斯、切比雪夫I、椭圆形、贝塞尔滤波器对理想侵彻加速度信号滤波之后的峰值误差与积分误差,提出将7阶切比雪夫I滤波器与FRR方法相结合的滤波方法,并在侵彻素混凝土的实测试验数据中进行验证。用此滤波方法对实测数据进行处理,得到的弹体刚体过载的一次积分与二次积分与实测数据的一次积分速度和实测侵彻深度的相对误差分别小于5%和10%,滤波前后积分速度保持非常好的一致性。     

Experimental results with a real-time adaptive ultrasonic imaging system for viewing through distorting media

An online adaptive phased-array ultrasonic imaging system capable of markedly improving the detectability of targets viewed through inhomogeneous media is described. An online adaptive phase correction technique implemented on a research phased-array scanner is described. The theoretical basis for this technique is presented by describing the relationship between the magnitude of phase aberrations and the regional brightness of speckle and pointlike targets. The system currently generates a corrected image in approximately 0.1 s and utilizes no prior knowledge of the aberrating media or the target. The adaptive imaging algorithm uses regional target brightness as a quality factor. The results of in vitro tests with this system using electronic and physical aberrators for both diffuse and pointlike targets are presented.     

Visible-regime polarimetric imager: a fully polarimetric,real-time imaging system

A fully polarimetric optical camera system has been constructed to obtain polarimetric information simultaneously from four synchronized charge-coupled device imagers at video frame rates of 60 Hz and a resolution of 640 x 480 pixels. The imagers view the same scene along the same optical axis by means of a four-way beam-splitting prism similar to ones used for multiple-imager, common-aperture color TV cameras. Appropriate polarizing filters in front of each imager provide the polarimetric information. Mueller matrix analysis of the polarimetric response of the prism, analyzing filters, and imagers is applied to the detected intensities in each imager as a function of the applied state of polarization over a wide range of linear and circular polarization combinations to obtain an average polarimetric calibration consistent to approximately 2%. Higher accuracies can be obtained by improvement of the polarimetric modeling of the splitting prism and by implementation of a pixel-by-pixel calibration.     

实时系统软件设计

嵌入式系统软件的设计是系统实时性的一个关键，本文基于RTOS的优缺点和windows编程的原理，阐述了时间分片技术应用于实时嵌入式系统的方法。