Granted Patent B2

US 12,514,564 · App. 18/251,421 · Granted Jan 6, 2026

Inventors: Elias M. Atmeh (San Jose, CA); Bruce R. Ritzi (Sunnyvale, CA); David J. Specht (Tucson, AZ)

Assignee: Maui Imaging, Inc.

A61B8/5269A61B8/4477A61B8/5207G06T5/70G06T2207/10136

Abstract

Claims (38)

1. A method of reducing noise in ultrasound imaging, comprising the steps of:

transmitting a first unfocused ultrasound pulse with a multiple-aperture ultrasound array into a region of interest having one or more types of tissue including bones;

receiving echoes from the region of interest with one or more receive elements of the multiple-aperture ultrasound array;

forming a digital data set for a plurality of pixels in the region of interest for each of the one or more receive elements;

conducting an average of all the digital data sets;

applying a control to mask data values from the digital data sets to include or exclude data based on a user-selected percentage of the average;

producing a masked data set output; and

beamforming the masked data set output to produce one or more ultrasound images.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the control mask eliminates data that falls outside of the user-selected percentage of the average.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein beamforming the masked data set output produces one or more 3D ultrasound images.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the beamforming is performed in real time, and wherein new data may be used to change or select a new masked data set output.

5. The method of claim 1 , further comprising adjusting the masked data values.

6. The method of claim 1 , further comprising transmitting a second unfocused ultrasound pulse into the region of interest and receiving echoes from the region of interest with one or more receive elements.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein beamforming the masked data set output produces an image of all or a subset of the region of interest.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the echoes may be received from one or more elements of the same array.

9. The method of claim 6 , wherein the first unfocused ultrasound pulse is transmitted with more ultrasound transducers than the second unfocused ultrasound pulse.

10. The method of claim 6 , wherein the second unfocused ultrasound pulse is transmitted with more ultrasound transducers than the first unfocused ultrasound pulse.

11. A method of reducing noise in ultrasound pulse imaging, comprising the steps of:

transmitting a first unfocused ultrasound pulse with a multiple-aperture ultrasound array into a region of interesting having one or more types of tissues;

receiving echoes from the region of interest with one or more receive elements of the multiple-aperture ultrasound array;

forming a first digital data set for echoes received by a first receiver element;

forming a second digital data set for echoes received by a second receiver element;

identifying groups of similar data where common values are shared between the first and second digital data sets;

masking data where common values are shared;

reducing gap values in the first and second digital data sets to zero or another values;

producing a masked data set output; and

beamforming the masked data set output to produce one or more ultrasound images.

12. A method of reducing noise in ultrasound imaging, comprising the steps of:

transmitting a first unfocused ultrasound pulse with a multiple-aperture ultrasound array into a region of interest having one or more types of tissue including bones;

receiving echoes from the region of interest with one or more receive elements of the multiple-aperture ultrasound array;

forming a first digital data set for echoes received by a first receiver element;

forming a second digital data set for echoes received by a second receiver element;

identifying groups of similar data in the first and second digital data sets;

correlating the similar data where common values are shared between the first and second digital data sets;

masking data where common values are shared;

keeping only data retained from gaps between the first and second digital data sets;

producing a masked data set output; and

beamforming the masked data set output to produce one or more ultrasound images.

Assignments (1)

Continuity (2)

References Cited (400)