A method for providing ultrasonic signal information includes receiving a plurality of echo signals, ascertaining a relatedness of individual echo signals from the plurality of echo signals based on a run time and/or a significance of the echo signals, grouping the echo signals for which a relatedness was ascertained in an echo signal group, and providing a property that is characteristic for the echo signal group. The present invention furthermore relates to a device associated with the method.

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.

A wideband sonar receiver is provided that includes: a selectable bandpass filter adapted to filter a received sonar signal to produce a filtered signal and a correlator adapted to correlate the baseband samples with baseband replica samples to provide a correlated signal. In addition, the wideband sonar receiver may include a shaping filter to shape unshaped received pulses. Finally, a variety of sonar processing algorithms are described with regard to reducing clutter and interference, target detection, and bottom detection.

A processor of a sonar system extracts a signal in a predetermined time range from a signal received by an acoustic array, calculates a correlation value for a signal waveform extracted, detects a peak value of the correlation value, calculates an integrated value by performing time-integration of a square of the correlation value, obtains a target velocity based on the peak value and the integrated value, and displays the target velocity on a display apparatus.

A method for detecting an obstacle utilizing reflected ultrasonic waves, comprises transmitting an ultrasonic burst transmission signal by an ultrasonic transmitter to a detection area to be observed and receiving an ultrasonic signal reflected by an obstacle in the detection area by an ultrasonic receiver as an ultrasonic reception signal. In the ultrasonic reception signal at least one echo is detected resulting from an obstacle. The echo section of the ultrasonic reception signal belonging to the echo is transformed from the time domain into the frequency domain. The frequency spectrum of the echo section is then examined for the presence of at least one of a plurality of predetermined spectral characteristics, wherein each spectral characteristic is representative of a predetermined obstacle type or a plurality of predetermined obstacle types. The echo section is allocated to a predetermined obstacle type based on the examination.

An electronic device and methods for providing high resolution ranging measurements are disclosed. The electronic device includes a pulse generator, a memory, an ADC, a timer, a comparator, a processing unit, connectors for coupling to a transceiver and instructions stored in the memory. The instructions, when performed by the processing unit, performs a method that determines an estimated time of arrival of a series of measurement pulses in the signal and turns on, prior to the estimated time of arrival, the ADC to capture the series of measurement pulses using a first resolution provided by sampling the signal at a rate equal to or greater than the Nyquist rate. The ADC remains on for a fixed time period sized to capture the series of measurement pulses.

Embodiments relate to noncontact determination of nonlinearities. Initially, a first and second primary signal are preconditioned to produce a first and second tone capable of reaching a target granular media. Using a sound source, the first and second primary signals are emitted such that the first and second primary signals combine in a nonlinear fashion in the target granular media to produce low frequency acoustic tone that is a difference between the first and primary signals. An acoustic pulse is received by an acoustic receiver, and a quadratic nonlinearity coefficient and an acoustic pressure field are determined based on the acoustic pulse. At this stage, a sediment shear strength of the granular media is correlated to the quadratic nonlinearity coefficient to generate a shear strength lookup table.

A method of detecting objects includes transmitting toward an object a first acoustic signal including a first set of pulses including a first number of pulses, and checking if a first echo signal resulting from reflection of the first acoustic signal is received with an intensity reaching an echo detection threshold. If the intensity of the first echo signal reaches the echo detection threshold, the distance to the object is calculated as a function of the time delay of the first echo signal. If the intensity of the first echo signal fails to reach the echo detection threshold, one or more further acoustic signals are transmitted including a set of pulses wherein the number of pulses is increased with respect to the number of pulses in said first acoustic signal.

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.

A method for providing ultrasonic signal information includes receiving a plurality of echo signals, ascertaining a relatedness of individual echo signals from the plurality of echo signals based on a run time and/or a significance of the echo signals, grouping the echo signals for which a relatedness was ascertained in an echo signal group, and providing a property that is characteristic for the echo signal group. The present invention furthermore relates to a device associated with the method.