Driving light emissions according to a jitter specification in a multispectral, fluorescence, and laser mapping imaging system

1 . A system comprising:

an emitter for emitting a plurality of pulses of electromagnetic radiation;

an image sensor comprising a pixel array for sensing reflected electromagnetic radiation;

a controller in electronic communication with the emitter and the image sensor; and

a driver for driving emissions by the emitter based at least in part on a jitter specification, wherein the jitter specification comprises unpredictable time variation experienced by a component of the system;

wherein at least a portion of the plurality of pulses of electromagnetic radiation emitted by the emitter comprises one or more of:

a plurality of spectral pulses for eliciting a spectral response from a tissue;

a fluorescence excitation wavelength of electromagnetic radiation; or

a mapping pulse for generating mapping information;

wherein the jitter specification varies according to a clock frequency of the image sensor; and

wherein the controller comprises one or more processors for executing instructions stored in non-transitory computer readable storage medium, the instructions comprising:

determining whether the jitter specification has a duration exceeding a threshold; and

in response to the jitter specification having a duration exceeding the threshold, causing the driver to limit a time duration of each of the pulses of electromagnetic radiation emitted by the emitter such that a pulse of electromagnetic radiation does not overlap a readout period of the image sensor.

2 . The system of claim 1 , further comprising a frequency detector in electronic communication with the controller.

3 . The system of claim 2 , wherein the controller comprises an oscillator, and wherein the frequency detector controls the clock frequency of the image sensor in response to one or more signals produced by the controller corresponding to a frequency of the oscillator.

4 . The system of claim 1 , wherein a time duration for reading out pixel data for a single pixel of the pixel array is a pixel readout length, and wherein the pixel readout length is greater than or equal to one or both of a first time delay for a control signal that activates the emitter and a second time delay of a control signal for a control signal that deactivates the emitter.

5 . The system of claim 1 , wherein the jitter specification represents one or more of:

variation in a predictable delay for initiating and/or discontinuing an emission of the pulses of electromagnetic radiation; or

jitter experienced by one or more of the emitter, the controller, or the driver.

6 . The system of claim 1 , wherein:

the driver is a component of the controller;

the controller is configured to control sequencing of the image sensor and the emitter such that the pulses of electromagnetic radiation emitted by the emitter are emitted during a blanking period of the image sensor; and

the controller is configured to cause the driver to drive the emitter to emit a pulse of electromagnetic radiation between readout periods of the image sensor.

7 . The system of claim 1 , wherein the jitter specification does not have a duration exceeding the threshold if the jitter specification has a duration less than or equal to one or more of:

one microsecond;

fifty nanoseconds;

a duration of time required for the image sensor to read out one line of the pixel array;

a duration of time required for the image sensor to read out one pixel of the pixel array;

less than or equal to 25% of a duration of time required for the image sensor to read out all active pixels in the pixel array; or

less than or equal to 25% of a duration of the readout period of the image sensor.

8 . The system of claim 1 , wherein the image sensor comprises a readout period of the image sensor, and wherein the readout period of the image sensor:

begins after reading out an initial row or an initial column of optical black pixels of the pixel array; and

ends after reading out a final row or a final column of optical black pixels of the pixel array.

9 . The system of claim 1 , wherein:

the image sensor is configured to generate and read out pixel data for an exposure frame based on the reflected electromagnetic radiation;

the pixel array comprises a plurality of lines for reading out active pixel data; and

the image sensor comprises a readout period, wherein the readout period is the time duration for reading out all the plurality of lines for reading out the active pixel data.

10 . The system of claim 9 , wherein the pixel array of the image sensor senses reflected electromagnetic radiation to generate a plurality of exposure frames during the readout period of the pixel array, wherein the readout period comprises a duration of time when active pixels in the pixel array are read, and wherein each of the plurality of exposure frames corresponds to one or more of the plurality of pulses of electromagnetic radiation emitted by the emitter.

11 . The system of claim 1 , wherein at least a portion of the pulses of electromagnetic radiation emitted by the emitter is a fluorescence excitation emission comprising the fluorescence excitation wavelength that results in a fluorescence exposure frame created by the image sensor, and wherein the controller is configured to provide the fluorescence exposure frame to a corresponding fluorescence system that determines a location of a tissue structure within a scene based on the fluorescence exposure frame.

12 . The system of claim 11 , wherein the controller is further configured to:

receive the location of the tissue structure from the corresponding fluorescence system;

generate an overlay frame comprising the location of the tissue structure; and

combine the overlay frame with a color image frame depicting the scene to indicate the location of the tissue structure within the scene.

13 . The system of claim 1 , wherein sensing the reflected electromagnetic radiation by the pixel array comprises generating a mapping exposure frame comprising the mapping information by sensing reflected electromagnetic radiation resulting from the emitter pulsing the mapping pulse of electromagnetic radiation, and wherein the controller is configured to:

provide the mapping exposure frame to a corresponding mapping system that analyzes the mapping information to determine one or more of:

a distance between two objects within a scene,

one or more dimensions of one or more objects within the scene,

existence and/or a location of one or more tools within the scene,

a three-dimensional topographical map of the scene,

an angle between an endoscope and an object, and

surface topology information about an object; and

receive the analyzed mapping information from the corresponding mapping system.

14 . The system of claim 1 , wherein at least a portion of the pulses of electromagnetic radiation emitted by the emitter comprises a plurality of tool-specific mapping patterns for each of a plurality of tools within a scene.

15 . The system of claim 1 , wherein the mapping pulse of electromagnetic radiation emitted by the emitter comprises a first output and a second output that are independent from one another, wherein the first output is for light illumination and the second output is for tool tracking.

16 . The system of claim 1 , wherein the controller is configured to synchronize timing of the pulses of electromagnetic radiation during a blanking period of the image sensor, wherein the blanking period corresponds to a time between a readout of a last row of active pixels in the pixel array and a beginning of a next subsequent readout of active pixels in the pixel array.

17 . The system of claim 1 , wherein two or more pulses of electromagnetic radiation emitted by the emitter result in two or more instances of reflected electromagnetic radiation that are sensed by the pixel array to generate two or more exposure frames that are combined to form an image frame; and

wherein the emitter is configured to emit a sequence of pulses of electromagnetic radiation repeatedly sufficient for generating a video stream comprising a plurality of image frames, wherein each image frame in the video stream comprises data from a plurality of exposure frames.

18 . The system of claim 1 , wherein at least a portion of the pulses of electromagnetic radiation emitted by the emitter is a spectral emission comprising the spectral responses of the plurality of spectral pulses that results in a spectral exposure frame created by the image sensor, and wherein the controller is configured to:

provide the spectral exposure frame to a corresponding spectral system that determines a location of a tissue structure within a scene based on the spectral exposure frame;

receive the location of the tissue structure from the corresponding spectral system;

generate an overlay frame comprising the location of the tissue structure; and

combine the overlay frame with a color image frame depicting the scene to indicate the location of the tissue structure within the scene; and

wherein the spectral emission comprises:

the electromagnetic radiation having a wavelength within a range from about 513 nm to about 545 nm and electromagnetic radiation having a wavelength within a range from about 900 nm to about 1000 nm; or

electromagnetic radiation having a wavelength within a range from about 565 nm to about 585 nm and electromagnetic radiation having a wavelength within a range from about 900 nm to about 1000 nm.

19 . The system of claim 3 , wherein the jitter specification is adjusted by altering the clock frequency of the image sensor.