There are provided an ultrasound image generating apparatus, which generates a high-quality ultrasound image even in a deep portion of a subject, and a control method thereof. In an ultrasound image (Img), for a portion (Ar1) equal to or less than a depth threshold value (D1), a real scanning line (L1) obtained from an acoustic wave echo signal is used. In the ultrasound image (Img), for a portion (Ar2) deeper than the depth threshold value (D1), an interpolation scanning line (L2) located between the real scanning lines (L1) is generated from an acoustic wave echo signal having a positional deviation between a focusing position of ultrasound waves and an observation target position. Also for a portion deeper than the interpolation scanning line (L2), a high-quality ultrasound image (Img) is obtained.

Systems and methods are disclosed for performing ultrasound imaging. Channel domain data can be received from an ultrasound transducer to form one or more channel domain data sets. A first ultrasound processing operation can be applied to the channel domain data to generate a first subset of one or more images from the one or more channel domain data sets. A second ultrasound processing operation can be applied to the channel domain data to generate a second subset of one or more images from the one or more channel domain data sets. Image characteristics of the first subset of one or more images and the second subset of one or more images can be regionally analyzed to identify regional image characteristics of the first and second subsets of one or more images. The first subset of one or more images can be blended with the second subset of one or more images based on the regional image characteristics to generate one or more composite images.

An ultrasonic diagnostic imaging system and method translates an aperture across an array transducer which is less that the size of the array. At each aperture location a transmit beam is focused above, or alternatively below, the array and a region of interest being scanned from the aperture location, resulting in broad insonification of the region of interest. At the lateral ends of the array the aperture is no longer translated but the focal point of the transmit beam is translated from the same aperture position, preferably with tilting of the beam direction. Multiple receive beams are processed in response to each transmit event and the overlapping receive beams and echo locations are spatially combined to produce synthetic transmit focusing over the center of the image field and noise reduction by spatial compounding at the lateral ends of the image field.

An ultrasonic diagnostic imaging system acquires received beams of echo signals produced in response to a plurality of transmit events. The received beams are combined with refocusing to account for differences in receive beam to transmit event locations. The delays and weights used in the refocusing are supplemented with delays and weights which correct for reverberation artifacts. The received echo signals are processed to detect the presence of reverberation artifacts and a simulated transmission of reverberation signal components to virtual point sources in the image field is calculated. This simulation produces the delays and weights used for reverberation signal compensation, or estimated reverberation signals which can be subtracted from received echo signals to reduce reverberation artifacts.

Front-end circuitry for an ultrasound system is described which comprises a beamformer FPGA integrated circuit, transmit ICs with both pulse transmitters and linear waveform transmitters, transmit control and receiver ICs, and analog-to-digital converter (ADC) ICs. Waveform data for both the linear and pulser transmitters is stored in the transmit control and receiver ICs, saving pins on the FPGA, which is the conventional source of this data. The ADCs couple digital echo data to the FPGA for beamforming over serial bus lines, saving additional FPGA pins over a conventional parallel data arrangement. The inclusion of both pulser and linear waveform transmit capabilities in the transmit ICs enables the use of both types of transmitters in the formation of a multi-mode image, such as use of the pulsers for Doppler beams and linear transmitters for B mode beams in the formation of a colorflow image.

An ultrasonic diagnostic imaging for analyzing shear wave characteristics utilizes a background motion compensation subsystem which acts as a spatial filter of pulse-to-pulse autocorrelation phases over the ROI of tracking pulse vectors to compensate for background motion. The subsystem is configured to compute the sum of all lag-1 autocorrelations of tracking line ensemble data over the tracking ROI, for each PRI. The inventive technique does not significantly reduce sensitivity to shear waves, because the shear wave is spatially smaller than the ROI.

An ultrasound signal processing device: performing events involving transmitting ultrasound towards a subject; receiving ultrasound reflection from the subject in response to each event; and generating a frame signal from sub-frame signals generated based on the ultrasound reflection. The device, in each event, causes a transmission aperture to transmit ultrasound focusing in the subject. A transmission aperture for one event differs in position, in a transducer element array direction, from a transmission aperture for a previous event by a shift amount of at least twice a transducer element width. The device, for each event, sets a target area which includes a position where transmitted ultrasound focuses and whose width in the transducer element array direction, at a depth where the transmitted ultrasound focuses, is equal to or greater than the shift amount. The device generates a sub-frame signal covering measurement points included in the target area.

An ultrasound probe (106) contains an array transducer (101) and a microbeamformer coupled to elements of the array. The microbeamformer comprises analog ASICs (102) with transmitters and amplifiers coupled to elements of the array (101). The microbeamformer also comprises analog to digital converters which convert received echo signals to digital data, and digital beamforming circuitry located in digital ASICs (103). The digital ASICs (103) are clocked at a lower core frequency than that of which the digital integrated circuit process of the digital ASICs (103) is capable, and the digital ASICs (103) are operated at a lower supply voltage than that for which the digital integrated circuit process is designed, both of which reduce power consumption by the microbeamformer.

A method for compensating a depth-dependent attenuation in ultrasonic signal data of a medium and a system for performing the method. The method is implemented by a processing system (8), the method comprising the following: processing (c), in which ultrasound signal data is processed by the processing unit for providing in-phase and quadrature phase (IQ) data of the medium, and attenuation compensation (f), in which a phase of the IQ data is compensated as a function of a respective frequency shift amount for each of a plurality of different depths (z.sub.1, z.sub.2, z.sub.n) in the medium, such that the IQ data spectrum is recentered across the plurality of different depths.

Systems and methods for processing an analog waveform before it is sampled by an analog-to-digital converter (ADC) for the purpose of multiline beamforming in an ultrasound system are provided. The multiline beamforming is enabled by delaying the same waveform by two different time delays and by re-combining the delayed waveforms. This approach leverages an architecture that can also be used for temporal filtering, in which a single acoustic signal can be read out of the ARAM twice, separated by time, taking advantage of the fact that the ARAM allows for non-destructive read operations.