KR20040069378A - Ultrasound imaging apparatus with transmit-focusing points selecting function and method therefor - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: An ultrasonic wave image acquisition and a method are provided to allow an operator to select freely a transmit-focusing point of ultrasonic wave signals at the region of interest while observing a displayed ultrasonic wave image. CONSTITUTION: An ultrasonic wave image acquisition comprises a storing unit for storing a plurality of delay time profiles; a controller(108) for selecting one of the delay time profiles; a pulse signal generator(106) for creating a plurality of pulse signals by responding to the delay time profiles; an ultrasonic wave transceiver for creating ultrasonic wave signals corresponding to the pulse signals and transmitting them to the objects and receiving ultrasonic wave signals reflected from the objects; and a signal processor(118) for creating ultrasonic wave images by processing the reflected ultrasonic wave signals.

Description

ULTRASOUND IMAGING APPARATUS WITH TRANSMIT-FOCUSING POINTS SELECTING FUNCTION AND METHOD THEREFOR}

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to the field of ultrasound imaging, and more particularly, to an ultrasound image acquisition device having a transmission focus point selection function capable of obtaining an ultrasound image by focusing an ultrasound signal on a transmission focus point selected by an operator. And to a method.

In the ultrasound diagnosis apparatus, ultrasound focusing is performed to observe a desired portion of an ultrasound image in detail. Such ultrasonic focusing includes "transmit-focusing" performed while transmitting ultrasonic waves to an object and "receive-focusing" performed while receiving ultrasonic signals reflected from the object. Receive focusing is to focus the ultrasound on all pixels on the screen on which the ultrasound image is to be displayed, and is widely used in the art.

However, unlike focusing, transmission focusing cannot be performed on a point on an object corresponding to every pixel on the screen on which an ultrasound image is to be displayed, and is usually performed at a preset focusing point preset by the manufacturer of the ultrasound diagnostic apparatus. Is being performed only for Therefore, in order to select the transmission focusing point, the operator may select a transmission focusing point close to a desired point on the object among several transmission focusing points preset by the manufacturer of the ultrasonic diagnostic device through a switch or button on the transmission focusing point input device of the ultrasonic diagnostic device. Select. Therefore, the conventional ultrasound diagnostic apparatus has a problem in that the operator cannot focus ultrasound on the desired precise point on the object.

Referring to FIG. 3, which illustrates an example of a conventional transmission focus point input interface, as illustrated in FIG. 3, a conventional ultrasound diagnostic apparatus includes a transmission focus point input interface through which an operator may input a transmission focus point. (interface) 302 is provided. The scan lines 308 shown in FIG. 3 are not actually displayed on the ultrasound image display area 304, but the correlation between the transmission focus point and the scan line displayed on the area 304 is shown. It is shown for illustrative purposes. As is widely known, in order to acquire an ultrasound image, ultrasound image data acquired on the scan lines 308 of FIG. 3 may be scanned and displayed at a corresponding pixel in the display area 304. Must be converted into existing data. Such a scan conversion process and a data conversion process are well known in the art, and thus can be fully understood by those skilled in the art, and thus, detailed description thereof will be omitted for convenience of description.

While the operator observes the ultrasound image currently displayed on the ultrasound image display area 304, within the ultrasound image being observed via a switch or button (not shown), for example, the scan lines 308 and the transmission focus line Close to the point where ultrasound transmit focus is desired, such as points on scan lines 308 where 312 intersect or points on scan lines 308 where scan lines 308 and transmit focus line 314 intersect. Select a preset transmission focus point. Then, an ultrasound image focused on an ultrasound signal may be acquired at the selected transmission focus point. However, as shown in FIG. 3, the conventional ultrasound diagnostic apparatus cannot provide a function of selecting a transmission focus point only within a desired region of interest in the ultrasound image that the operator is observing, and thus the operator is observing. There is no choice but to select a predetermined transmit focus point that spans all scan lines 308 of the ultrasound image. As a result, a conventional ultrasound diagnostic apparatus acquires an ultrasound image by focusing an ultrasound signal at a transmission focus point on all scan lines 308 corresponding to a transmission focus point line selected by an operator, thereby obtaining a frame rate of an ultrasound image obtained by There is another problem that the frame rate) must be lowered.

Thus, the operator improves the signal processing speed by performing ultrasound focusing only at the selected focusing point of each scan line while observing the ultrasound image of the currently displayed object, and thus the overall frame rate of the acquired focused ultrasound image. There is a need for an ultrasound image acquisition apparatus and method capable of maintaining a high speed.

The present invention has been made to solve the above-described problems of the prior art, and the operator performs ultrasound focusing only at a plurality of transmission focus points selected while the operator observes the currently displayed ultrasound image of the object, thereby achieving an ultrasound image at a high frame rate. An object of the present invention is to provide an apparatus and method for acquiring an ultrasound image having a transmission focus point selection function capable of acquiring a signal.

According to the invention, there are provided storage means for storing a plurality of time delay profiles, control means for selecting one of a plurality of stored time delay profiles, and a plurality of pulses in response to the selected time delay profile. pulse signal generating means for generating a pulse) signal, ultrasonic transmitting and receiving means for generating and transmitting an ultrasonic signal corresponding to the pulse signal to the object and receiving the reflected ultrasonic signal, and processing the reflected ultrasonic signal A signal processing means for generating an ultrasound image of the, and displaying the generated ultrasound image so that an operator selects at least one region of interest within the ultrasound image, and coordinates of the selected region of interest Detecting means for detecting the control means, wherein the control means An ultrasound image acquisition apparatus is provided that determines at least one transmission focus point according to coordinates and selects a new time delay profile among a plurality of stored time delay profiles based on the determined transmission focus point.

In addition, according to the present invention, a) transmitting an ultrasound signal having a predetermined initial time delay profile to the object and displaying the ultrasound image obtained by processing the ultrasound signal reflected therefrom, and b) the ultrasound image currently displayed Detecting coordinates of at least one region of interest selected by the operator within the space, c) determining at least one transmission focus point for focusing the ultrasonic signal according to the coordinates of the selected region of interest, and d) determining transmission. Selecting a new time delay profile based on the focal point, and e) generating an updated ultrasound image of the object by transmitting an ultrasound signal having the determined new time delay profile to the object and processing the reflected ultrasound signal therefrom. An ultrasound image acquisition method is provided.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS Fig. 1 is a schematic block diagram of an apparatus for acquiring an ultrasound image by performing focusing of an ultrasonic signal on a transmission focusing point selected by an operator according to the present invention.

2 is a flowchart for explaining a method for acquiring ultrasound images by performing ultrasound focusing on a transmission focus point selected by an operator according to the present invention;

3 is a diagram illustrating an example of a focusing point input interface provided by a conventional ultrasound image acquisition apparatus.

4 is a diagram illustrating an example of a transmission focus point selection interface provided by the input device illustrated in FIG. 1.

<Description of the symbols for the main parts of the drawings>

102: transducer array

104: cable

106: pulse generator

108: controller

110: database

112: input device

114: analog-to-digital converter (ADC)

116: beam former

118: signal processor

120: display

Referring to FIG. 1, there is shown a schematic block diagram of an ultrasound imaging apparatus having a transmission focus point selection function according to the present invention. As shown in FIG. 1, the ultrasound imaging apparatus 100 includes an ultrasound transducer array 102, a pulse generator 106, a controller 108, a database 110, an input device 112, and an analog. A digital transducer (ADC) 114, a beam former 116, a signal processor 118, a display 120, an ultrasonic transducer array 102, a pulse generator 106 and an ADC It further includes a cable 104 for connecting 114. According to the present invention, since the operator substantially selects a transmit-focusing point for focusing the ultrasound signal only by selecting a desired region of interest in the ultrasound image under observation, the following description will be made. In this context, the terms "region of interest selection" and "transmission focus point selection" should be understood and interpreted to have substantially the same meaning.

The input device 112 provides a function for an operator to select a region of interest within an ultrasound image of an object acquired by the ultrasound imaging apparatus 100 and currently displayed, and detects the selected region of interest. It performs the function. For example, the input device 112 provides a transmit focus point selection interface 402 as shown in FIG. While the operator observes the ultrasound image currently displayed on area 404, the operator's finger or a separate selection tool (eg, a stylus) is used to select region of interest 406. The input device 112 may be implemented as a conventional touch screen, and as described above, the operator may touch the desired point of the ultrasound image under observation by using a finger or a stylus. The selection is complete. The input device 112 then detects the location of the selected region of interest 406 within the region 404. Since the position detection process by the input device 112 is obvious to those skilled in the art, a description thereof will be omitted herein. Although only one region of interest 406 is shown in FIG. 4, it is obvious that multiple regions of interest may exist. In addition, although a plurality of scan lines S _{1 to} S _N are shown on the region 404 of the transmission focus point selection interface 402 of FIG. 4, this is illustrated for convenience of description as described above with reference to FIG. 3. It is.

Referring again to FIG. 1, the controller 108 is connected to an input device 112, a database 110, and a signal processor 118, through which the region of interest 406 selected by the operator via the input device 112 ( A scan line and a transmission focus point on the scan line are included in the scan line). As shown in FIG. 5, the controller 108 determines scan lines S _{1 to} S ₄ included in the region of interest 406 selected by the operator based on the scan line information transmitted from the signal processor 118. The transmission focal points P _{1 to} P ₈ on the scan lines S _{1 to} S ₄ are determined. In this case, the scan lines S _{5 to} S _N are not included in the selected region of interest 406 and thus are not selected. Here, although the number of transmission focus points on each scan line is determined to be two, this is an example, and the number of transmission focus points may be determined in consideration of the frame rate of the ultrasound image to be obtained.

Next, the controller 108 transmits the determined focus point P ₁ to a ₈ ~P performing transmission focusing of the ultrasound to obtain an ultrasound image, the time delay of ultrasound signals corresponding to the determined transmission focus point P ₁ ~P ₈ respectively Determine the profile. At this time, the controller 108 corresponds to each of the determined focusing points P _{1 to} P ₈ from the database 110 which previously stores the time delay profiles for all selectable focusing points in the ultrasound image that the operator is observing. The time delay profile is retrieved and determined and sent to the pulse generator 106. Here, when the operation speed of the controller 108 is high, the ultrasonic waves corresponding to each of the determined focal points P _{1 to} P ₈ are determined without using the time delay profile previously stored in the database 110. It will be understood by those skilled in the art that the time delay profile of a signal can be calculated directly.

The pulse generator 106 generates a pulse for generating an ultrasonic signal having such a time delay profile, based on the time delay profile transmitted from the controller 108, and transmits it via the cable 104 to the transducer array 102. To send.

Transducer array 102 is coupled to pulse generator 106 via cable 104 and generates an ultrasonic signal having a determined time delay profile in response to a pulse transmitted from pulse generator 106. The transducer array 102 then focuses and transmits the generated ultrasonic signal.

The reflected ultrasound signal reflected from the object and received by the transducer array 102 is composed of an ultrasound image of the object via the ADC 114, the beam former 116, and the signal processor 118, as is well known. It is displayed via the display 120. In this case, the signal processor 118 performs a scan conversion for converting the ultrasound image into a format suitable for display on the display 120 and transmits the information obtained during the scan conversion to the controller 108. Thereby allowing the controller 108 to determine the scan lines included in the region of interest 406.

When generating the ultrasound image, the signal processor 118 may sequentially process the reflected ultrasound signals corresponding to each scan line S _{1 to} S ₄ including the determined transmission focus points P _{1 to} P ₈ to generate an ultrasound image. However, in order to increase the frame rate of the generated ultrasound image, it may be processed using a scan line interleave method. In detail, the signal processor 118 first processes the reflected ultrasonic signal corresponding to the transmission focus point on the scan lines S ₁ and S ₃ to generate one frame image data, and then on the scan lines S ₂ and S ₄ . The reflected ultrasound signal corresponding to the transmission focus point is processed. Subsequently, by combining these data to form one complete frame image data, an ultrasound image can be generated by performing ultrasound focusing on the determined transmission focus points P _{1 to} P ₈ without reducing the overall frame rate. . Alternatively, the signal processor 118 processes the reflected ultrasonic signals sequentially, but does not sequentially process the reflected ultrasonic signals corresponding to all of the transmission focus points on each scan line, for example, the transmission focus points P1 and P4. And sequentially process the reflected ultrasound signals corresponding to P5 and P8, and then generate an ultrasound image by using a transmission focus interleaving method to sequentially process the reflected ultrasound signals corresponding to the transmission focus points P2, P3, P6 and P7. You may.

In the present specification, as shown in FIG. 1, the input device 112 and the display 120 are illustrated and described as separate, but those skilled in the art will fully understand that they may be configured as one unit.

Referring to FIG. 2, a flowchart for explaining a method of obtaining ultrasound images by performing ultrasound focusing on a transmission focus point selected by an operator according to the present invention is illustrated. First, in operation S202, an ultrasound image obtained by using an ultrasound signal having a predetermined initial time delay profile selected by the controller 108 among a plurality of time delay profiles stored in the database 110 may be displayed. Display on area 404 of input device 112. In step S404, the input device 112 detects the region of interest 406 selected by the operator via the transmission focus point selection interface 402 as shown in FIG.

In step S206, the input device 112 determines whether the operator selects another region of interest. If the operator selects another region of interest, the process according to the invention returns to step S204 and the input device 112 performs the above-described process. In contrast, if the operator does not select another region of interest, ie when the region of interest selection is complete, the process according to the invention proceeds to step S208.

In step S208, the controller 108 determines the scan line included in the selected region of interest based on the information about the selected region of interest transmitted from the input device 112 and the scan line information transmitted from the signal processor 118. A plurality of transmit focus points on each of the scan lines are determined. As described above, the information about the region of interest includes coordinates of the region of interest selected within the region 404, and the scan line information includes the scan line and the region 404 obtained by the signal processor 118 during the scan conversion process. Information indicating a correlation between an image pixel and a scan line.

In step S210, the controller 108 selects a new time delay profile from the plurality of time delay profiles stored in the database 110 for focusing the ultrasonic signal at the determined transmission focus point. At this time, as described above, the controller 108 may directly calculate a new time delay profile.

In step S212, the controller 108 sends the selected or calculated new time delay profile to the pulse generator 106. The pulse generator 106 generates a pulse for generating an ultrasonic signal having a new time delay profile and transmits it through the cable 104 to the transducer array 102. In response to the pulse transmitted from the pulse generator 106, the transducer array 102 generates and transmits an ultrasonic signal having a new time delay profile to the object.

In step S214, the ADC 114 receives the ultrasonic signal reflected from the object through the cable 104 from the transducer array 102. The reflected ultrasonic signal is transmitted to the signal processor 118 via the ADC 114 and the beam former 116. The signal processor 118 processes the reflected ultrasound signal to generate an updated ultrasound image. In this case, the signal processor 118 may generate the updated ultrasound image while maintaining the high frame rate by processing the reflected ultrasound signal using the scan line interleave method or the transmission focus point interleave method as described above.

As described above, according to the present invention, the operator can freely select the transmission focus point of the ultrasound signal in the region of interest while observing the ultrasound image currently displayed, and the ultrasound focus is focused only on the scan line that spans the selected transmission focus point. By performing the above operation, the focused ultrasound image may be acquired without lowering the overall frame rate of the ultrasound image of the acquired object.

While the present invention has been described and illustrated by way of preferred embodiments, those skilled in the art will recognize that various modifications and changes can be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the appended claims.

Claims (8)

An ultrasound image acquisition device having a transmission focus point selection function, Storage means for storing a plurality of delay time profiles; Control means for selecting one of the stored plurality of time delay profiles; Pulse signal generating means for generating a plurality of pulse signals in response to the selected time delay profile; Ultrasonic transmitting and receiving means for generating and transmitting ultrasonic signals corresponding to the plurality of pulse signals to the object and receiving the ultrasonic signals reflected from the object; Signal processing means for generating the ultrasound image of the object by processing the reflected ultrasound signal; Detection means for displaying the ultrasound image, allowing an operator to select at least one region of interest within the displayed ultrasound image, and detecting coordinates of the selected region of interest Including, The control means determines an at least one transmission focus point according to the detected coordinates of the ROI, and selects a new time delay profile among the stored plurality of time delay profiles based on the determined transmission focus point. . The method of claim 1, The signal processing means includes a scan converting unit converting the ultrasound image into a format for displaying on the display area, and the scan converting unit converts the scan line information acquired during the format conversion of the ultrasound image into the control means. Providing an ultrasonic image acquisition device. The method of claim 1, The detecting means comprises a touch screen (touch screen). The method of claim 1, And the signal processing unit processes the reflected ultrasonic signal in any one of a scan line and a transmission focusing point interleave method to generate the updated ultrasonic image. The method of claim 1, And the detecting means comprises a separate display device for displaying the ultrasound image and the updated ultrasound image. The method of claim 1, And the control means generates the new time delay profile. In the method for obtaining an ultrasound image, a) transmitting an ultrasound signal having a predetermined initial time delay profile to the object, and displaying an ultrasound image of the object obtained by processing the ultrasound signal reflected from the object; b) detecting coordinates of at least one ROI selected by an operator in the displayed ultrasound image; c) determining at least one transmission focus point for focusing an ultrasonic signal according to the coordinates of the selected region of interest; d) determining a new time delay profile based on the determined focus point; e) generating an updated ultrasound image of the object by transmitting the ultrasound signal having the determined new time delay profile to the object and processing the reflected ultrasound signal from the object; Ultrasonic image acquisition method comprising a. The method of claim 7, wherein The step (e) is an ultrasound image acquisition method of generating the updated ultrasound image by processing the reflected ultrasound signal in any one of the scan line and transmission focus point interleave method.