An ultrasound imaging system probe comprises an imaging transducer head and a reception circuit for processing received reflected ultrasound signals. The reception circuit comprises an analogue to digital sigma delta converter which comprises a closed loop which comprises a tunable band pass filter. This enables the analog to digital converter to process only the desired frequency band. The ADC conversion bandwidth and ENOB are in this way programmable giving a more efficient probe design, and also enabling analog to digital conversion early in the signal processing chain.

An ultrasound signal processing apparatus includes: a receiver configured to receive a positive phase ultrasound reception signal and a negative phase ultrasound reception signal; and a processor including hardware, the processor being configured to perform phasing addition on each of the positive phase ultrasound reception signal and the negative phase ultrasound reception signal, and adding the positive phase ultrasound reception signal subjected to the phasing addition and the negative phase ultrasound reception signal subjected to the phasing addition with shifting of a predetermined period of time.

A diagnostic ultrasound apparatus includes: a sound ray signal generator that generates a sound ray signal based on a reception signal obtained from an ultrasound probe that transmits and receives ultrasound to and from a subject; an imaging signal generator that performs filtering of passing different bands on the sound ray signal to generate multiple imaging signals from the sound ray signal; and a calculator that performs an arithmetic operation among the imaging signals.

A system and method include control of an ultrasound system transducer to acquire an echo signal power spectrum of a region of tissue for a fundamental frequency band and an echo signal power spectrum of the region of tissue for a harmonic frequency band, wherein a center frequency of the harmonic frequency band is substantially similar to a center frequency of the fundamental frequency band, determination of a first backscatter coefficient based on the echo signal power spectrum of the region of tissue for a fundamental frequency band and an echo signal power spectrum of a reference phantom for the fundamental frequency band, determination of a value representing a second backscatter coefficient and a non-linearity term associated with the region of tissue based on the echo signal power spectrum of the region of tissue for the harmonic frequency band and an echo signal power spectrum of the reference phantom for the harmonic frequency band, determination of the non-linearity term associated with the region of tissue based on the first backscatter coefficient and the value, and display the second backscatter coefficient, the non-linearity term, and a B-mode image of the region of tissue.

Methods and apparatus measuring tissue nonlinear shear wave property are disclosed. When tissue shear responses are different to ultrasound radiation forces generated by pulses having different shapes, its nonlinear effect can be used to estimate tissue property at single location without measurements of group velocities or phase velocities. Ultrasound radiation force using a single tone burst pulse is applied to a selected location in a tissue region. The induced shear wave is detected in the region and its spectral distribution is calculated and analyzed. This detection may be repeated with other excitation pulses having different widths or different shapes at the same location. The spectral analysis of the detected shear wave is performed according to a nonlinear shear model for solving nonlinearity and viscoelasticity of the tissue at a single location in a tissue region. The detection location can be at one point at a time for imaging two-dimensional or three-dimensional tissue nonlinearities and shear wave properties. The property includes nonlinear magnitude variations, nonlinear phase variations, nonlinear coefficients, and viscoelasticity. The induced shear wave are detected at multiple locations along the shear propagation directions in the tissue region for calculating different shear group velocities and different shear phase velocities using different excitation pulses, and calculating nonlinearity and viscoelasticity. A difference between certain aspects of this disclosure and the prior art of ultrasound elastography is the utilization of nonlinear responses of the tissue shear property.

The invention provides an improved acoustic energy generating apparatus that includes an improved backing structure. The improved backing structure employs protrusions that are not located in a uniform pattern along a forward side surface of the backing structure, to realize improved re-direction of acoustic energy towards a forward direction relative to the acoustic energy generating apparatus.

1.sup.st and 2.sup.nd pulsed waves (103, 104) with 1.sup.st and 2.sup.nd center frequencies are transmitted along 1.sup.st and 2.sup.nd transmit beams so that the 1.sup.st and 2.sup.nd pulsed waves overlap at least in an overlap region (Z) to produce nonlinear interaction scattering sources in said region. The scattered signal components from at least the nonlinear interaction scattering sources are picked up by a receiver (102) and processed to suppress other components than said nonlinear interaction scattered signal components, to provide nonlinear interaction measurement or image signals. At least a receive beam is scanned in an azimuth or combined azimuth and elevation direction to produce 2D or 3D images of said nonlinear interaction scattering sources.

An ultrasound diagnosis apparatus according to an embodiment includes an obtaining unit, an image generating unit, and a controlling unit. The obtaining unit obtains setting information in which a plurality of types of ultrasound image data are set as display-purpose image data and in which a percentage of a time period to display the display-purpose image data is set for each of the plurality of types. The image generating unit generates, along a time series, each of the plurality of types of ultrasound image data set in the setting information. The controlling unit exercises control so that the plurality of types of ultrasound image data generated by the image generating unit are stored into a storage unit and exercises control so that the display-purpose image data is displayed on a display unit according to the percentage set in the setting information for each of the types.

An ultrasound diagnostic apparatus including an ultrasound probe which outputs transmission ultrasound corresponding to a drive signal, which receives reflected ultrasound from the subject and which outputs a received signal according to the reflected ultrasound; a drive signal outputter which outputs the drive signal to the ultrasound probe; a hardware processor which controls the drive signal outputter to output a first drive signal having a first drive waveform and a second drive signal having a second drive waveform that is different from the first drive waveform; a received signal generator which generates a first received signal based on the reflected ultrasound corresponding to the transmission ultrasound that is output based on the first drive signal and a second received signal based on the reflected ultrasound corresponding to the transmission ultrasound that is output based on the second drive signal; and an extractor which extracts by arithmetic of the first received signal and the second received signal a received signal component which to be used in imaging. Frequency spectrums of the first drive signal and the second drive signal have a first intensity peak on a low frequency side of a center frequency of the transmission frequency, a second intensity peak on a high frequency side of the center frequency and a third intensity peak at a frequency between a frequency corresponding to the first intensity peak and a frequency corresponding to the second intensity peak, in a frequency band included in a transmission frequency band at −20 dB of the ultrasound probe.

An ultrasonic diagnostic scanner is provided which includes a transmitting and receiving unit that transmits two kinds of ultrasonic waves with inverted phases to each of a plurality of scanning lines and receives first and second echo signals corresponding to the two kinds of ultrasonic waves from one scanning line to another, a first adder that obtains a third echo signal by adding up the first and second echo signals for each scanning line, a first signal generating unit that generates a first processed signal from the first echo signal and a second processed signal from the third echo signal, a second adder that generates a third processed signal from the first and second processed signals, an image processor that generates an ultrasonic image from the third processed signal, and an display monitor that displays the ultrasonic image.