JPS6150557A - Ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) [Summary] This bulletin contains application data before electronic filing, so abstract data is not recorded.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION (a) Industrial Applicability The present invention relates to an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus capable of displaying tomography (images) such as B mode.

(b) Conventional technology and its problems In general, the average sound speed of ultrasound in human tissue is 1530 m.
/sec. Therefore, when attempting to display a tomographic image of a human body up to a predetermined depth, for example, a depth of about 15.3 cm, it takes 200 μsec to obtain ultrasound echo data for one ultrasound scanning line. And 307
In the case of displaying a tomographic image at a rate of 165 rams/sec, one frame needs to be composed of 165 ultrasonic scanning lines.

However, conventionally, when displaying this tomographic image on a display such as an XY monitor, as shown by the broken line in FIG. 3, several tens of μsee h・
It takes several hundred microseconds. Therefore, the time for actual display is subtracted by the retrace period, and the number of displayed ultrasonic waves becomes considerably smaller than 165. As a result, the displayed tomographic image becomes a rough image, making it difficult to perform accurate diagnosis.

(c) Purpose of the Invention It is an object of the present invention to solve the conventional problem of shading, increase the number of scanning lines of a display, and display an even more detailed tomographic image.

(d) Structure In order to achieve the above-mentioned object, the present invention has first and second line pans 7 memory which store data corresponding to one ultrasonic scanning line among the ultrasonic echo data obtained from the probe. an interpolation circuit that creates interpolation data for interpolating between previous and subsequent ultrasound scanning lines based on the two-leg sonic echo data output from the first and second line buffer memories; and the first and second line buffer memories. A display device that displays both the ultrasonic echo data that is output from the camera and the interpolated data that is generated by the interpolation circuit, and first and second line buffer memories that are used during the scanning period of the bright spot of this display device and during the retrace period, respectively. and a control circuit for reading out the ultrasonic echo data from the ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus, so that interpolated data for interpolating between ultrasonic scanning lines can be displayed during the blanking period. The present invention will be explained in detail based on embodiment 'A' shown in the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus according to the present invention.

In the figure, numeral 1 indicates an ultrasonic diagnostic device, 2 a probe that linearly scans (or sector scans) the ultrasonic beam, and 4 a drive circuit that outputs a drive pulse to excite the probe 2. be.

6 is a delivery circuit that amplifies and detects the ultrasonic echo data received by the probe 2; 8 is an A/D converter; 10.1
2 are first and second line buffs 77 memories each storing data corresponding to one ultrasonic scanning line among the eight ultrasonic echo data obtained from the probe 2; 14 is an A/D converter 8; A first switching circuit 16 switches the connection between the first and second line buffer memories 10.12, and the first switching circuit 16 switches the previous and next ultrasonic waves based on the image sound wave data output from the first and second line buffer memories 10.12.
1. This is an interpolation circuit that creates interpolation data for interpolating between scanning lines. 18 is the first and second line pan 77 memory 1
20 is a D/A converter, 22 is a D/A converter, and 22 is a D/A converter.
This is an XY monitor display that displays both the ultrasonic echo data that has passed through the A converter 20 and the interpolated data. Reference numeral 24 denotes a timing signal generation circuit which outputs a timing signal of a predetermined period, and 26 receives the timing signal of this timing signal generation circuit 24 and generates the h-th and h-th signals during the scanning period of the bright spot of the display 22 and the +S line period, respectively. A control circuit 28 reads out the ultrasonic echo data from the two-line buffer memory 10.12, and a sweep signal generating circuit 28 generates a sweep signal in response to a control signal output from the control circuit 26.

Next, a tomographic image display operation of the ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus having such a configuration will be explained.

First, the drive circuit 4 outputs a drive pulse based on the timing signal from the timing signal generation circuit 24 to the probe 2 . As a result, the probe 2 is excited and an ultrasonic beam is emitted into the subject. The echo of the ultrasonic diagnostic beam from inside the subject is received by the probe 2 again. The probe 2 outputs ultrasonic echo data based on the received ultrasonic echoes to the next-stage wave receiving circuit 6. The wave receiving circuit 6 amplifies and detects the ultrasonic echo data, digitizes it with the A/D converter 8, and then sends it to the first switching circuit 14. First switching circuit 1
4, first and second line buffer memories 10 .
12 alternately. Therefore, the first, second
Ultrasonic echo data corresponding to one ultrasonic scanning line are stored in the line buffer memories 10 and 12, respectively. Further, the huntroll circuit 26 reads the ultrasonic echo data from the first and second line buffer memories 10.12 during the scanning period of the bright spot of the display 22 and during the retrace period. The control timing for loading and reading the ultrasonic echo data to the second line buffer memory 10.12 is similar to that for each cycle. First, during a period corresponding to the first bright spot scan of the display 22, ultrasound diagnostic echo data is read from the first line buffer memory 10, and ultrasound echo data is written to the second line buffer memory 12. Ultrasonic echo data is read out in parallel from the first and second line buffer memories during a period corresponding to the retrace period of the display 22, and subsequently during a period corresponding to the next bright spot scan of the display 22. In addition to reading the ultrasound echo data from the second line buffer memory 12,
01 In the above operation of writing ultrasonic echo data to the line buffer memory 10, when reading the ultrasonic echo data from @1 and the second line pamphlet 7 memory 10.12 in parallel, the order of reading is reversed. Then, the interpolation circuit 16 performs previous and subsequent ultrasound scans based on both ultrasound echo data read out in parallel from the first and second line buffer memories 10 and 12. Create interpolation data to interpolate between lines. The second switching circuit responds to the control signal from the control circuit 2G whenever human data is output from the first and second line/...7 memory 10.12 and the interpolation circuit 16. to switch connections and select data output. The ultrasonic echo data and interpolated data that have passed through the second switching circuit 1 are converted into analog data by a D/A converter 20 and then provided to a display 22 as a luminance signal. On the other hand, the sweep signal generating circuit 28 generates a sweep signal in response to the control signal from the sweep control circuit 26, and supplies this sweep signal to the display 22. By this sweep signal, the bright spot is synchronized with the reading timing of the ultrasonic echo data from the first and second line bar/fur memories 10.12, for example, as shown in FIG. 2(a) (or FIG. 2(b)). As shown in FIGS. 1 and 2, the data is scanned from top to bottom one time, and then from bottom to top in synchronization with the output timing of the interpolation data from the interpolation circuit 16. Therefore, the display 22 displays ultrasonic echo data based on the ultrasonic scanning line as the bright spot is scanned from the top to the bottom, without causing any grating/king time. As the scanning progresses, interpolated data that supplements the interval between ultrasonic scanning lines is displayed. Since the interpolated data between the ultrasonic scanning lines is displayed during this time, the displayed image becomes more dense than the conventional RANO.

Therefore, an excellent effect is achieved in that accurate diagnosis can be performed.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

1 and 2 show an embodiment of the present invention. FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus, and FIG. b) is an explanatory diagram showing display examples of tomographic images in sector scanning;
FIG. 3 is an explanatory diagram showing an example of displaying a tomographic image in one conventional linear scan. 1... Ultrasonic diagnostic device, 2... Probe, 10...
1st line pan 77 memory, 12... 2nd line buffer memory, 16... interpolation circuit, 22... display device,
26...Huntroll circuit.

Claims (1)

[Claims] (1) First and second line buffer memories that store data equivalent to one ultrasonic scanning line among the ultrasonic echo data obtained from the probe, and output from these first and second line buffer memories. an interpolation circuit that creates interpolation data for interpolating between the preceding and succeeding ultrasound scan lines based on the ultrasound echo data that has been generated, and the ultrasound echo data that is output from the first and second line buffer memories and the output from the interpolation circuit. A display that displays interpolated data together with the interpolated data, and a first
An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus comprising: a control circuit that reads the ultrasonic echo data from a second line buffer memory, and displays the interpolated data during a retrace period.