An ultrasonic device includes a plurality of ultrasonic wave transmitting sections adapted to transmit an ultrasonic wave as a fundamental wave, and a plurality of ultrasonic wave receiving sections capable of receiving a second-order harmonic wave with respect to the fundamental wave, the plurality of ultrasonic wave transmitting sections and the plurality of ultrasonic wave receiving sections are arranged along an X direction, the plurality of ultrasonic wave receiving sections are arranged at first intervals corresponding to the order of the second-order harmonic wave, the N ultrasonic wave transmitting sections constitute a single transmission channel, and are wired with each other, and the transmission channels are arranged at second intervals each twice as long as the first interval. N is a natural number.

Methods and devices for imaging of microcalcification particles using ultrasound. The method may include delivering a multi-pulse transmit packet of an acoustic line to a predetermined location within a tissue having or suspected of having a microcalcification; causing the microcalcification to move or oscillate, comparing one or more received signals from the location over multiple transmissions, and determining frequency modulation of the returning pulses as a result of the microcalcification oscillation or random pattern movement.

Methods and instrumentation for estimation of nonlinear bulk elasticity parameters (NEP) of a material through measuring nonlinear propagation delays (NPDs) at a set of multiple range cells along at least one transmit beam axis, and adapting said NEPs to minimize a functional of the NEPs. The method calculates a distance between a model of the NPDs with the NEPs as input and the measured NPDs, and estimated NEPs are obtained at the minimum of the functional. The NPDs are measured by transmitting at least two pulse complexes comprising a low frequency (LF) and a high frequency (HF) pulse with differences in the LF pulse, along at least one common LF and HF transmit beam axes, and gating out HF receive signals from a multitude of depth ranges along said at least one HF transmit beam axis, and comparing the HF receive signals from two pulse complexes with difference in the LF pulse for each depth range.

Systems and methods for ultrasound imaging using a delay-encoded harmonic imaging (DE-HI) technique is provided. An ultrasound pulse sequence is coded using temporal delays between ultrasound emissions within a single transmission event. This coded scheme allows for harmonic imaging to be implemented. The temporal time delay-codes are applied temporally to multiple different ultrasound emissions within a single transmission event, rather than spatially across different transmitting elements. The received radio frequency (RF) signals undergo a decoding process in the frequency domain to recover the signals, as they would be obtained from standard single emissions, for subsequent compounding. As one specific example, a one-quarter period time delay can be used to encode second harmonic signals from each angle emission during a single multiplane wave (MW) transmission event, rather than inverting the polarity of the pulses as in conventional MW imaging.

An ultrasound system (1) is disclosed that comprises a probe (10) including an array (110) of CMUT (capacitive micromachined ultrasound transducer) cells (100), each cell comprising a substrate (112) carrying a first electrode (122), the substrate being spatially separated from a flexible membrane (114) including a second electrode (120) by a gap (118); and a bias voltage source (45) coupled to said probe and adapted to provide the respective first electrodes and second electrodes of at least some of the CMUT cells with a monotonically varying bias voltage including a monotonically varying frequency modulation in a transmission mode of said probe such that the CMUT cells are operated in a collapsed state and transmit at least one chirped pulse during said transmission mode. Such a system for instance may be an ultrasound imaging system or an ultrasound therapeutic system. An ultrasonic pulse generation method using such as system is also disclosed.

An ultrasound diagnostic apparatus of the present invention includes: a transmitter that generates and outputs a plurality of drive signals to a transducer of an ultrasound probe, the drive signals causing the transducer to transmit a plurality of transmission ultrasound waves that have different waveforms in a temporally shifted manner, the drive signals being compensated for asymmetry of the transmission sound pressure waveforms of the plurality of transmission ultrasound waves transmitted from the transducer; and a hardware processor configured to extract a harmonic component according to a plurality of reception signals, and generating an ultrasound image based on the extracted harmonic component.

According to one embodiment, an ultrasound diagnosis apparatus includes a storage and processing circuitry. The storage is configured to store noise data acquired in advance with respect to each scan line. The processing circuitry is configured to subtract, from raster data sequentially acquired, the noise data corresponding to a scan line of the raster data over a plurality of frames.

A diagnostic ultrasound image of a region of interest (ROI) of a body is formed by transmitting into the ROI at least a first and a second ultrasound pulse, in which the second pulse is phase-shifted relative to the first pulse by an amount other than 0 or a multiple of 180 degrees. Discretized receive signals from the pulses are interleaved to form a resultant operating signal that is detected and beamformed as the operating signal.

There is provided a technique for obtaining a high-quality image by extracting only a nonlinear component with high accuracy in ultrasonic imaging using an amplitude modulation method of THI. By removing a fundamental wave component with high accuracy by making the influence of electrical distortion due to analog amplification on the echo signals of ultrasonic waves having different sound pressure levels approximately the same, only the nonlinear component is extracted with high accuracy. For example, the above influence is made to be the same by controlling the amplification factor of an amplification section. In addition, the above influence is made to be the same by restoring the digital data with a filter.

Systems and methods for performing multi-frequency harmonic acoustography for target identification and border detection are described, where a focused confocal transducer having a piezoelectric element and a hydrophone positioned centrally in the piezoelectric element is used. The transducer emits ultrasonic waves toward a target of interest at first and second frequencies. The two waves interfere at a focal plane within the target to generate a third acoustic wave. The target absorbs energy and emits its own unique vibration at the difference frequency (f) of the two waves as well as its harmonics. The unique vibration is recorded with a hydrophone, and mechanical properties of the target are ascertained through detection and analysis of the third acoustic wave using a mathematical model implemented by a signal processing circuit.