Synthetic aperture (SA) technique is a novel approach to present day commercial systems and has previously not been used in medical ultrasound imaging. The basic idea of SA is to combine information acquired simultaneously from all directions over a number of emissions and to reconstruct the full image from these data.
The paper presents the multi-element STA (MSTA) method for medical ultrasound imaging. The main difference with the STA approach is the use of a few elements in the transmit mode in contrast to a single element aperture. This allows increasing the system frame rate, decreasing the number of emissions, and provides the best compromise between the penetration depth and lateral resolution. Besides, a modified MSTA is proposed with a corresponding RF signal correction in the receive mode, which accounts for the element directivity property.
In the experiments a 32-element linear transducer array with 0.48 mm inter-element spacing and a burst pulse of 100 ns duration were used. Two elements wide transmission aperture was used to generate an ultrasound wave covering the full image region. The comparison of 2D ultrasound images of a tissue mimicking phantom obtained using the STA and MSTA methods is presented to demonstrate the benefits of the second one.
The paper presents the optimization problem for the multi-element synthetic transmit aperture method (MSTA) in ultrasound imaging applications. The optimal choice of the transmit aperture size is made as a trade-off between the lateral resolution, penetration depth and the frame rate. Results of the analysis obtained by a developed optimization algorithm are presented. The maximum penetration depth and lateral resolution at given depths are chosen as optimization criteria. The results of numerical experiments carried out in MATLAB® using synthetic aperture data of point reflectors obtained by the FIELD II simulation program are presented. The visualization of experimental synthetic aperture data of a tissue mimicking phantom and in vitro measurements of the beef liver performed using the SonixTOUCH Research system are also shown.
Directional excitation of sound in an aperiodic finite baffle system is analyzed using a method developed earlier in electrostatics. The solution to the corresponding boundary value problem is obtained in the spatial-frequency domain. The acoustic pressure and normal particle velocity distribution in acoustic media can be easily computed by the inverse Fourier transform from their spatial spectra on the baffle plane. The presented method can be used for linear acoustic phased arrays modeling with finite element size and inter-element interactions taken into account. Some illustrative numerical examples presenting the far-field radiation pattern and wave-beam steering are given.
Sound localization problems are usually tackled by the acquisition of data from phased microphone arrays and the application of acoustic holography or beamforming algorithms. However, the number of sensors required to achieve reliable results is often prohibitive, particularly if the frequency range of interest is wide. It is shown that the number of sensors required can be reduced dramatically providing the sound field is time stationary. The use of scanning techniques such as “Scan & Paint” allows for the gathering of data across a sound field in a fast and efficient way, using a single sensor and webcam only. It is also possible to characterize the relative phase field by including an additional static microphone during the acquisition process. This paper presents the theoretical and experimental basis of the proposed method to localise sound sources using only one fixed microphone and one moving acoustic sensor. The accuracy and resolution of the method have been proven to be comparable to large microphone arrays, thus constituting the so called “virtual phased arrays”.
The work presents the results of experimental study on the possibilities of determining the source of an ultrasonic signal in two-dimensional space (distance, horizontal angle). During the research the team used a self-constructed linear array of MEMS microphones. Knowledge in the field of sonar systems was utilized to analyse and design a location system based on a microphone array. Using the above mentioned transducers and broadband ultrasound sources allows a quantitative comparison of estimation of the location of an ultrasonic wave source with the use of broadband modulated signals (modelled on bats' echolocation signals) to be performed. During the laboratory research the team used various signal processing algorithms, which made it possible to select an optimal processing strategy, where the sending signal is known.
Beamforming is an advanced signal processing technique used in sensor arrays for directional signal transmission
or reception. The paper deals with a system based on an ultrasound transmitter and an array of
receivers, to determine the distance to an obstacle by measuring the time of flight and – using the phase
beamforming technique to process the output signals of receivers for finding the direction from which the
reflected signal is received – locates the obstacle. The embedded beam-former interacts with a PID-based
line follower robot to improve performance of the line follower navigation algorithm by detecting and
avoiding obstacles. The PID (proportional-integral-derivative) algorithm is also typically used to control
industrial processes. It calculates the difference between a measured value and a desired set of points, then
attempts to minimize the error by adjusting the output. The overall navigation system combines a PID-based
trajectory follower with a spatial-temporal filter (beamformer) that uses the output of an array of sensors to
extract signals received from an obstacle in a particular direction in order to guide an autonomous vehicle
or a robot along a safe path.
With the advent of massive MIMO and mmWave, Antenna selection is the new frontier in hybrid beamforming employed in 5G base stations. Tele-operators are reworking on the components while upgrading to 5G where the antenna is a last-mile device. The burden on the physical layer not only demands smart and adaptive antennas but also an intelligent antenna selection mechanism to reduce power consumption and improve system capacity while degrading the hardware cost and complexity. This work focuses on reducing the power consumption and finding the optimal number of RF chains for a given millimeter wave massive MIMO system. At first, we investigate the power scaling method for both perfect Channel State Information (CSI) and imperfect CSI where the power is reduced by ��/���� and ��/√���� respectively. We further propose to reduce the power consumption by emphasizing on the subdued resolution of Analog-to-Digital Converters (ADCs) with quantization awareness. The proposed algorithm selects the optimal number of antenna elements based on the resolution of ADCs without compromising on the quality of reception. The performance of the proposed algorithm shows significant improvement when compared with conventional and random antenna selection methods.
The paper presents the theoretical and experimental study of synthetic transmit aperture (STA) method combined with Golay coded transmission for medical ultrasound imaging applications. The transmission of long waveforms characterized by a particular autocorrelation function allows to increase the total energy of the transmitted signal without increasing the peak pressure. It can also improve signal-to-noise ratio and increase the visualization depth maintaining the ultrasound image resolution.
In the work the 128-element linear transducer array with 0.3 mm pitch excited by the 8 and 16-bits Golay coded sequences as well as a one cycle at nominal frequencies 4 MHz were used. The comparison of 2D ultrasound images of the tissue mimicking phantoms is presented to demonstrate the benefits of coded transmission. The image reconstruction was performed using synthetic STA algorithm with transmit and receive signals correction based on a single element directivity function.