An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus is provided for allowing a displacement between a direction of an acoustic line of ultrasound and a direction of movement of biological tissue to be recognized. The apparatus includes a strain calculating section for calculating a strain in biological tissue based on two temporally different echo signals in an identical acoustic line acquired by an ultrasonic probe; an elasticity image data generating section for generating data for an elasticity image according to the strain calculated by the strain calculating section; a movement detecting section for detecting movement of the biological tissue in a B-mode image; an angle calculating section for calculating an angle between a direction of an acoustic line of ultrasound transmitted/received by the ultrasonic probe and a direction of movement of the biological tissue detected by the movement detecting section; and an image display processing section for displaying an indicator indicating the angle.

A quantitative ultrasound (QUS) system for characterizing a specimen, the system comprising an ultrasound transducer operable to transmit ultrasound signals into the specimen along multiple adjacent scan lines extending axially within the specimen, and collect returned ultrasound signals therefrom and generate RF signals based on said returned ultrasound signals, wherein said RF signals are associated with respective ones of said scan lines to represent a characteristic of the specimen at each of multiple locations within the specimen along each of said scan lines; and a parallelizable processing unit communicatively coupled to said ultrasound transducer and operable to concurrently compute from said RF signals respective QUS values representative of said characteristic for each of a plurality of said multiple locations in parallel, wherein successive parallel outputs of said respective QUS values are characteristic of the specimen along each of said multiple scan lines.

The embodiments of the present disclosure disclose an ultrasound imaging method and system, the method may include transmitting a plurality of plane wave ultrasound beams to a scan target and acquiring corresponding plane wave echo signals; transmitting focused ultrasound beams to the scan target and acquiring corresponding focused beam echo signals; acquiring a plurality of velocity components of a target point in the scan target using the plane wave echo signals, and acquiring velocity vectors of the target point according to the plurality of velocity components; acquiring an ultrasound image of the scan target using the focused beam echo signals; and displaying the velocity vector and the ultrasound image.

An ultrasound diagnostic apparatus generates an ultrasound image based on an ultrasound signal acquired by an ultrasound probe having an ultrasound transducer. The ultrasound transducer transmits an ultrasound wave to an observation target and receives the ultrasound wave reflected from the observation target. The apparatus includes: an analysis unit configured to generate analysis data based on the ultrasound signal received from the observation target; and a correction unit configured to correct the analysis data using correction data based on first reference data and second reference data, the first reference data being obtained from an ultrasound signal received from a reference reflector by using the ultrasound transducer or another ultrasound transducer of a same type as that of the ultrasound transducer, the second reference data being obtained from the ultrasound signal received from the reference reflector by using still another ultrasound transducer of different type from that of the ultrasound transducer.

Example apparatus, systems, and methods for image data processing are disclosed and described. An example system includes an image capturer to facilitate capture of an image. The example system includes a Doppler spectrum recorder to record a Doppler spectrum. The example system includes a study type inferrer to infer a study type associated with the Doppler spectrum by: processing the Doppler spectrum using at least one neural network to generate a first probability distribution among study type classifications; processing the image using the at least one neural network to generate a second probability distribution among the study type classifications; and combining the first probability distribution and the second probability distribution to infer a study type.

An ultrasound imaging system according to the present disclosure may include an ultrasound probe, a display unit, and a processor configured to receive source image data having a first dynamic range, wherein the source image data comprises log compressed echo intensity values based on the ultrasound echoes detected by the ultrasound probe, generate a histogram of at least a portion of source image data, generate a cumulative density function for the histogram, receive an indication of at least two points on the cumulative density function (CDF), and cause the display unit to display an ultrasound image representative of the source image data displayed in accordance with the second dynamic range.

An ultrasonic imaging system and an imaging method. The imaging method comprises: transmitting a divergent ultrasonic beam to a scanning object, and scanning the scanning object with the divergent ultrasonic beam (S11); a self-scanning object receiving an echo of the divergent ultrasonic beam, and obtaining divergent ultrasonic echo signals by means of beam synthesis (S12); obtaining blood flow velocity vector information of the scanning object according to the divergent ultrasonic echo signals (S13); and displaying the blood flow velocity vector information of the scanning object (S14). Using a divergent ultrasonic beam to perform blood flow imaging can ensure that there is a sufficiently large scanning area for covering a scanning object, thereby achieving ultrasonic blood flow imaging at a high frame rate.

An ultrasound system performs duplex colorflow and spectral Doppler imaging, with the spectral Doppler interrogation performed at a sample volume location shown on the colorflow image. The colorflow image is displayed in a color box overlaid on a co-registered B mode image. A color box position and steering angle processor analyzes the spatial Doppler data and automatically sets the color box angle and location over a blood vessel for optimal Doppler sensitivity and accuracy. The processor may also automatically set the flow angle correction cursor in alignment with the direction of flow. In a preferred embodiment these optimization adjustments are made automatically and continuously as a user pauses at points for Doppler measurements along a length of the blood vessel.

The present disclosure describes systems and methods configured to determine shear wave velocity and tissue stiffness levels of thin tissue of finite size, also referred to as bounded tissue, via shear wave elastography. Systems can include an ultrasound transducer configured to acquire echoes responsive to pulses transmitted toward a tissue. Systems can also transmit a push pulse into the tissue for generating shear waves, and tracking pulses intersecting the shear waves. The system can also apply a directional filter to received echo data and generate directionally filtered shear wave data based on a dimension and angular orientation of the bounded target relative to the ultrasound transducer. The system can estimate velocities of the shear waves at different shear wave frequencies based on the filtered shear wave data and angular orientation relative to the transducer, and determine a tissue stiffness value independent of the shape or form of the tissue.

An ultrasound diagnostic apparatus 1 includes a transducer array 2, a transmission unit 3 that transmits an ultrasonic pulse FP and an ultrasonic pulse SP having phases inverted from each other on the scanning line from the transducer array 2 multiple times, a reception unit 4 that acquires reception signals from an output signal of the transducer array 2, a quadrature detection unit 5 that performs quadrature detection on the reception signals to acquire IQ signal strings, a tissue velocity detection unit 6 that detects a velocity of a tissue in a subject based on the IQ signal strings, a phase correction unit 7 that corrects phases of the IQ signal strings, a pulse inversion addition unit 8 that adds IQ signals corresponding to the ultrasonic pulse FP and IQ signals corresponding to the ultrasonic pulse SP using the corrected IQ signal strings to acquire added signals, and an image generation unit 10 that generates an ultrasound image from the added signals.