A method for displaying a passive cavitation image that shows characteristic information of a passive cavitation includes: receiving an ultrasound signal caused by the passive cavitation; generating a plurality of first passive cavitation images for the passive cavitation at predetermined respective time frame using the received ultrasound signal by a DAS beam forming; generating a plurality of second passive cavitation images in which a maximum magnitude signal region is displayed by selecting a main lobe region having a magnitude greater than or equal to a predetermined value in the respective first passive cavitation image; generating a main lobe passive cavitation image in which a main region is displayed in the respective time frame by superimposing the plurality of the second passive cavitation images obtained for the respective time frame; and generating a passive cavitation image by displaying the main lobe passive cavitation image on a background image.

Estimation and imaging of linear and nonlinear propagation and scattering parameters in a material object where the material parameters for wave propagation and scattering has a nonlinear dependence on the wave field amplitude. The methods comprise transmitting at least two pulse complexes composed of co-propagating high frequency (HF) and low frequency (LF) pulses along at least one LF and HF transmit beam axis, where said HF pulse propagates close to the crest or trough of the LF pulse along at least one HF transmit beam, and where one of the amplitude and polarity of the LF pulse varies between at least two transmitted pulse complexes. At least one HF receive beam crosses the HF transmit beam at an angle >20 deg to provide at least two HF cross-beam receive signals from at least two transmitted pulse complexes with different LF pulses. The HF cross-beam receive signals are processed to estimate one or both of i) a nonlinear propagation delay (NPD), and ii) a nonlinear pulse form distortion (PFD) of the transmitted HF pulse for said cross-beam observation cell.

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.

A method, device, and system for obtaining time of flight images is provided. A surgical plan may be received and a first path for a first robotic arm and a second path for a second robotic arm may be determined based on the surgical plan. The first robotic arm may be caused to move on the first path and may be configured to hold a transducer. The second robotic arm may be caused to move on the second path and may be configured to hold a receiver. At least one image may be received from the receiver, the image depicting patient anatomy and generated using time-of-flight measurements.

Systems and methods for improving the quality of ultrasound images made up of a combination of multiple sub-images include giving more weight to sub-image information that is more likely to improve a combined image quality. Weighting factor information may be determined from the geometry (e.g., angle or path length) of a location of one or more specific transducer elements relative to a specific point within a region of interest or a region of an image. In some embodiments, any given pixel (or other discrete region of an image) may be formed by combining received echo data in a manner that gives more weight to data that is likely to improve image quality, and/or discounting or ignoring data that is likely to detract from image quality (e.g., by introducing noise or by increasing point spread).

An imaging device includes a transducer that includes an array of piezoelectric elements formed on a substrate. Each piezoelectric element includes at least one membrane suspended from the substrate, at least one bottom electrode disposed on the membrane, at least one piezoelectric layer disposed on the bottom electrode, and at least one top electrode disposed on the at least one piezoelectric layer. Adjacent piezoelectric elements are configured to be isolated acoustically from each other. The device is utilized to measure flow or flow along with imaging anatomy.

Two-dimensional transducers arrays for ultrasound imaging is disclosed. The two-dimensional arrays are suitable for formation of two-dimensional (2D) and/or three-dimensional (3D) ultrasound images. The two-dimensional arrays are suitable for real-time 2D and/or 3D ultrasound imaging. The bowtie transducer arrays and the rectangular transducer arrays are suitable for real-time 2D and/or 3D ultrasound imaging.

The invention is to provide an ultrasonic image with a clear tissue structure while reducing speckle noise of the ultrasonic image. An ultrasonic wave is transmitted from the transducer to the subject, and an echo generated in the subject is received. The first ultrasonic image and the second ultrasonic image are generated using a reception signal. The second ultrasonic image is an image smoother than the first ultrasonic image. The image processing unit calculates filter coefficients using pixel values of corresponding pixels of the first ultrasonic image and the second ultrasonic image, and generates an output image by processing one of the first ultrasonic image and the second ultrasonic image using the filter coefficients.

A transducer array (802) includes at least one 1D array of transducing elements (804). The at least one 1D array of transducing elements includes a plurality of transducing elements (904). A first of the plurality of transducing elements has a first apodization and a second of the plurality of transducing elements has a second apodization. The first apodization and the second apodization are different. The transducer array further includes at least one electrically conductive element (910) in electrical communication with each of the plurality of transducing elements. The transducer array further includes at least one electrical contact (906) in electrical communication with the at least one electrically conductive element. The at least one electrical contact concurrently addresses the plurality of transducing elements through the at least one electrically conductive element.

An ultrasound system is disclosed comprising an ultrasound transducer array (100) comprising a plurality of ultrasound transducer cells (130), each of said cell having an independently adjustable position and/or orientation such as to conform an ultrasound transmitting surface of the cell to a region of a body and a controller (140). The controller is configured to register the respective ultrasound transducer cells by simultaneously operating at least two ultrasound transducer cells in a transmit mode in which the cells transmit distinguishable ultrasound signals and operating the remaining ultrasound transducer cells in a receive mode. The controller extracts time-of-flight information of the respective ultrasound signals between transmitter and receiver and by systematically selecting different ultrasound transducer cells as transmitters, the controller collects sufficient time-of-flight information from which the respective position and/or relative orientation of the ultrasound transducer cells within the ultrasound transducer array may be derived. A method for operating the ultrasound system in this manner as well as a computer program product is also disclosed.