Ultrasound fusion harmonic imaging systems and methods

摘要

An ultrasound imaging system includes: a harmonic filter coupled to an ultrasound transmitter to reduce transmitted harmonic components; a fundamental filter coupled with an ultrasound receiver to reduce received fundamental components; and a fusion processor configured to generate multiple frames of fusion images for two subsequent frames of ultrasound transmissions to improve frame rate. The ultrasound receiver may optionally perform signal alignment and matching to improve image quality. To improve image quality, the ultrasound system may optionally use multiple amplitude-modulated transmit pulses with different delays, or multiple transmit pulses with different amplitudes to extract harmonic signals.

主权项

1. An ultrasound imaging system, comprising:
an ultrasound transducer; a transmit beamformer; a receiver beamformer; a harmonic filter coupled between the ultrasound transducer and the transmit beamformer to reduce transmitted harmonic components; a fundamental filter coupled between the ultrasound transducer and the receiver beamformer to reduce received fundamental components; a fusion processor to generate multiple frames of fusion images from subsequent frames of ultrasound transmissions; a transmit/receive switch to couple either the transmit beamformer or the receive beamformer to the ultrasound transducer; a first switch to connect the harmonic filter between the transmit beamformer and the transmit/receive switch when in a first mode and to connect the transmit beamformer to the transmit/receive switch without going through the harmonic filter when in a second mode; and a second switch to connect the fundamental filter between the receive beamformer and the transmit/receive switch when in a first mode and to connect the receive beamformer to the transmit/receive switch without going through the fundamental filter when in a second mode; wherein the fusion processor combines a harmonic frame derived from a first pair of the subsequent frames with a fundamental frame derived from a second pair of the subsequent frames, or combines a fundamental frame derived from the first pair of the subsequent frames with a harmonic frame derived from the second pair of the subsequent frames, to generate one of the multiple frames.