The beamforming technique has been successfully used for real-time ultrasound imaging and applications. Traditionally, the most commercially available ultrasound systems still implement standard Delay-and-Sum (DAS) beamforming for B-mode imaging. This technique performs the time delay and coherent summation of ultrasonic radiofrequency (RF) echoes received by individual transducer elements to align the backscattered signals at the focal point. However, the transducer aperture size and system operating frequency limit the image resolution and contrast achievable with DAS. For this reason, new methods based on adaptive beamforming algorithms, such as Minimum Variance (MV), have been studied to improve the quality of the signal received by the transducer and reduce the effects of noise and interference. This work compares a B-mode ultrasound image generated by the DAS technique and the MV combined with DAS beamforming using Field II acoustic field simulation software. A simulated phantom with 18 targets, separated into three groups, and surrounded by a uniform background, was created. For qualitative analysis, two-dimensional and three-dimensional images simulated using DAS and MV beamformers are presented. The quantitative analyses were employed to compare the performance of the MV over the DAS beamforming using axial and lateral full width at half maximum (FWHM) and geometric distortion ratio (GDR) measurements of the central target group. According to those metrics, no significant changes were observed regarding the axial FWHM. However, the MV method considerably reduced the lateral FWHM by more than 40%, with a minimum GDR of 37%.
KEYWORDS: Digital signal processing, Field programmable gate arrays, Data modeling, Apodization, Phased arrays, Signal processing, Model-based design, Ultrasonography, Data conversion, Finite impulse response filters
In this paper we present a model-based Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) design flow for ultrasound imaging using the delay-and-sum (DAS) beamforming technique. The beamformer model is based on DSP Builder toolbox in the Matlab/Simulink environment, used for fast prototype design and automatic hardware description language code generation for Intel FPGAs. The design was synthesized for an Intel Stratix IV FPGA and implemented on a Terasic DE4- 230 board, including the following digital signal processing steps: digital filtering, focusing delay adjustment, apodization, coherent summation, envelope detection and logarithmic compression. To evaluate our model, we used raw radiofrequency data from a phantom acquired using a 128-element convex transducer (2-5 MHz) with an active aperture of 8 elements. A Nios II processor was integrated into the FPGA to send and receive data from the model and transmit them to the host computer for off-line scan conversion and B-mode image generation. The results show that the proposed strategy is efficient for rapid prototyping of FPGA devices in ultrasound imaging applications. The overall FPGA resources utilization was less than 15%, indicating that other digital signal processing algorithms, such as interpolation, decimation, and scan conversion, can be implemented using this design methodology in both medical and non-destructive imaging applications.
Open ultrasound platforms foster the development of novel image processing techniques due to its flexibility in terms of both software and hardware updates. There is a growing need for rapid prototyping and modelling platforms can be used to develop high-level applications, such as MATLAB/Simulink. Although there are several model-based methods for ultrasound imaging described in the literature, most of them focus on specific digital signal processing stages, and there is little assessment of the simulation environment of Model Composer and System Generator for Xilinx Field-programmable Gate Arrays (FPGA). The purpose of this article is to implement the steps of an ultrasound reception beamforming using the delay and sum technique for B-mode imaging, and then comparing the results between a reference MATLAB script and the results from Xilinx based-model implemented in Simulink environment. The simulation uses 12-bit ultrasound data sampled at 40 MHz from a phantom acquired with a 128-element transducer with an aperture of 8 elements. The design was synthesized for a Xilinx Zynq 7000 FPGA. The qualitative results of the generated B-mode imagens are in excellent agreement, with a CNR error of 0.01, and a processed envelope with NRMSE of 0.085%. In conclusion, the use of tools such as Model Composer and system generator proved to be adequate for rapid prototyping and yields very accurate results for FPGA simulations when compared to MATLAB calculations.
Safety, performance, economy and durability are essential items to qualify materials for the manufacturing of structures used in different areas. Generally, the materials used for this purpose are formed by composites and sometimes they can present failure during the manufacturing process. Such failures can also occur during use due to fatigue and wear, causing damage often difficult to be visually detected. In these cases, the use of non destructive testing (NDT) has proven to be a good choice for assessing the materials quality. The objective of this work was the electromechanical impedance evaluation of massive aluminum structures using ultrasonic transducers to detect discontinuities in the material. The tests have been done using an impedance analyzer (Agilent 4294A), an ultrasound transducer (1.6 MHz of central frequency), two types of PZT ceramics (0.267 mm and 1 mm thickness) and four aluminum samples (250 x 50 x 50 mm) with the transducer placed at three different regions. One sample was kept intact (reference) and the others were drilled in three positions with different sizes of holes (5 mm. 8 mm and 11 mm). The electromechanical impedance was recorded for each sample. The root mean square deviation index (RMSD) between the impedance magnitude of the reference and damaged samples was calculated and it was observed an increase in the RMSD due to the increase of the diameter of the holes (failures) in the samples completely drilled. The results show that the proposed methodology is suitable for monitoring the integrity of aluminum samples. The technique may be evaluated in characterizing other materials to be used in the construction of prostheses and orthoses.
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