Abstract: An ROI (region of interest) is drawn according to common and shape variables. The common variables are common to ROIs irrespectively of the shape thereof. Expressions defining relations between the common and shape variables are determined and stored for each ROI in advance. When an instruction is issued to replace a first ROI with a second ROI having a different shape, shape variables for the second ROI are calculated from the common variables of the first ROI according to the expressions, and the second ROI defined by the calculated shape variables is displayed.

Abstract: An ultrasonic diagnostic system incorporates therein a technique of extracting an outline of the tissue within the subject. The ultrasonic diagnostic system is functionally capable of objectively extracting the outline of the tissue without a manual work, or with only a simple manual work. A gradient on each point of a tomographic image is evaluated, a scalar quantity representative of the magnitude of the gradient is evaluated, a maximal point of the scalar quantity is evaluated, and the outline of the tissue is extracted on the basis of the maximal point thus evaluated. When the outline is extracted, an arithmetic effective domain is determined beforehand so that the outline is extracted only within the determined arithmetic effective domain. Further, a movement of the subject, which extends through a plurality of frames, is detected to vary the outline on the basis of the movement detected.

Abstract: There is provided an ultrasonic diagnostic system wherein received signals are generated in such a manner that ultrasonic pulse beams are transmitted within a subject and reflecting ultrasonic waves from an inside of the subject are received, and a tomographic image is obtained on the basis of the received signals. The ultrasonic diagnostic system is capable of detecting a velocity or a velocity gradient as to the tissue within the subject. Two digital complex signals [R.sub.i (t)+j I.sub.i (t)] and [R.sub.i (t+.DELTA..tau.)+j I.sub.i (t+.DELTA..tau.)], which are apart from each other by .DELTA..tau., are obtained from a complex signal (quadrature detection signal) [h.sub.ci (t)+j h.sub.si (t)] outputted from a complex signal conversion circuit. A phase difference .DELTA..theta..sub.i,i+1 (t) is determined from a complex correlation value C.sub.i,i (t,.DELTA..tau.) of these two complex signals. Further, the phase difference .DELTA..theta..sub.i,i+1 (t) is determined from a complex correlation value C.sub.

Abstract: Disclosed is an ultrasonic doppler diagnostic system for obtaining blood flow information in the human body under examination utilizing ultrasonic Doppler effect, comprising: a clutter information detecting means for obtaining a moving velocity and/or its variance of clutter components on the basis of a received signal; a clutter information removing means for obtaining a clutter removing signal by removing clutter component information carried in the received signal from the received signal on the basis of the obtained moving velocity and/or variance; and a blood flow detecting means for obtaining blood flow information on the basis of the clutter removing signal. With this arrangement, it is possible to selectively remove only the clutter component information, provided that even if the blood flow is very slow, the Doppler shift frequencies of the blood flow component and clutter components are different from each other.

Abstract: The present invention relates to an ultrasonic echographic diagnostic apparatus which is capable of displaying the characteristics and properties of tissue, such as the maximum displacement of tissue, the hardness of tissue, the velocity of propagation of vibrations through tissue, and the magnitude and direction of movement of tissue, in various display modes. The apparatus is capable of detecting and displaying the displacement of tissue caused by heartbeat or external pressure in a real-time mode by calculating the minute displacement of tissue or the differential of the same, calculating a temporal local maximum of the minute displacement varying with time, time corresponding to the temporal local maximum, the gradient of the time and the absolute magnitude of the gradient, and displaying the results of the calculations.

Abstract: The present invention relates to an ultrasonic synthetic aperture diagnostic apparatus which detects information concerning an internal structure of an object to be examined by making each of a plurality of arranged transducers sequentially emits an ultrasonic pulse signal into the object in turn, receiving each ultrasonic echo reflected by the internal structure of the object by the plurality of transducers in each ultrasonic scanning cycle, and obtaining information concerning the internal structure of the object on the basis of input signals provided by the plurality of transducers. The present invention is intended to provide an ultrasonic synthetic aperture diagnostic apparatus capable operating at a high frame rate and of forming a clear picture of high quality even if the object is moving.

Abstract: An apparatus for obtaining a blood backscattering power, comprising a signal input unit for inputting an electric signal which is converted from an ultrasound signal which has been generated in a certain depth in the human body by reflecting or backscattering; a Doppler spectrum obtaining unit for obtaining a Doppler spectrum which contains information on a distribution of an intensity of the above electric signal as a function of a time and a Doppler frequency, where the Doppler frequency is a quantity indicating a velocity component in a direction of the above transmitted ultrasound signal, of an object which backscatters the transmitted ultrasound signal; a Doppler frequency range determining unit for determining an elimination frequency range of the above Doppler frequency for each time; and an accumulating unit for accumulating the above intensity over a whole range of the above Doppler frequency except the above elimination frequency range for each time, to obtain a blood backscattering power of the tim

Abstract: An ultrasonic imaging apparatus for obtaining a two-dimensional distribution of a predetermined characteristic parameter of a medium of the ultrasound at various points in a plane. The apparatus contains a unit for designating a region of interest in said plane, and a unit for obtaining and indicating statistical information on a dispersing characteristic of said predetermined characteristic parameter of the medium at the various points in the region of interest of said plane. In addition, the apparatus contains a unit for obtaining and indicating a recent history of the dispersing characteristics during the operation of obtaining the two-dimensional distributions which are most recently carried out. Further, the apparatus contains a unit for obtaining and indicating the plane for which the minimum standard deviation is obtained, and a unit for indicating the two-dimensional distribution for the plane.

Abstract: An ultrasonic color Doppler diagnostic apparatus for displaying at least two successive frames of original images of the two-dimensional images obtained for each ultrasonic interframe time, to find and display a natural interpolated image. The apparatus includes a shape parameter calculating unit which calculates the shape parameters characterizing the shape of a blood flow region on the original images and, a shape parameter interpolating unit which calculates the shape parameters interpolated at a designated timing designated in the interframe time from the shape parameters, the interframe time. In addition and the designated timing, an image converting unit is provided which converts the image of at least one frame of the original image in the plurality of original images in accordance with the shape parameters at a designated timing found by the shape parameter interpolating means to obtain the interpolated image.

Abstract: Ultrasound diagnostic equipment comprises a tissue power unit for calculating tissue scattering power of tissues of an object of measurement in an organ, a blood power unit for calculating scattering power of blood in the organ and estimating blood scattering power at a portion of the tissues of the object of measurement by using the calculated scattering power of the blood, an integrated backscatter unit for normalizing the tissue scattering power by using the estimated blood scattering power and calculating an integrated backscatter by the normalized tissue scattering power, and a display unit for displaying the integrated backscatter. Therefore, the integrated backscatter of the tissues can be quantitatively estimated without being influenced by attenuation. Furthermore, this estimated quantitative integrated backscatter of the tissues is displayed on the display unit accompanied with a B-mode image, an electrocardiogram, and the like, so that diagnostic accuracy can be increased.

Abstract: Ultrasound diagnostic equipment for diagnosing a region of interest of an organ by using a scattering coefficient and an attenuation slope comprises a scattering power calculation unit for calculating a scattering spectrum of the region of interest, a cumulative attenuation slope calculation unit for calculating a cumulative attenuation slope of the intervening tissue between a body surface and a position of blood close to the region of interest by using a scattering coefficient of blood which is previously known, and a scattering coefficient calculation unit for calculating a scattering coefficient of the region of interest by using the calculated cumulative attenuation slope of the intervening tissue between body surface and the blood close to the region of interest.

Abstract: An ultrasonic analyzer used in an ultrasonic diagnosis instrument for minimizing the effects of noise in echo signals.

Abstract: The present invention relates to a signal processing apparatus for quantitatively measuring ultrasonic characteristics of a medium, such as a human body and realizes the high speed quantitative measurement by processing all signals in the time domain. In the processing for eliminating an error, produced by a degree of convergence of the ultrasonic beam, a correcting function that is a function of the depth and frequency is employed. The correcting function is measured in a no-attenuation medium and converted into a form suited to the time domain processing. The function is stored and such frequency characteristics of the function are sequentially read during an actual medium measurement to control the characteristic of a variable characteristic filter to correct the received signal.

Abstract: An apparatus for measuring acoustic characteristic values of a medium by sending ultrasound pulses into the medium and analyzing the reflected waves from the medium. Medium characteristic values are extracted from the reflected waves, and spectrum scalloping is eliminated. The present invention executes the nonlinear filtering process, for example, the median filtering process to the spectrums, applies a model spectrum to the filtered result and thereby facilitates measurement of supressing fluctuation even when a small number of space average samples one used, by obtaining .beta. from such model spectrum.

Abstract: A diagnosis apparatus for discriminating a property of the tissue to be observed from the reflected ultrasonic wave uses the nature of the fine structure of the tissue, and more practically uses the interval of small reflecting bodies dispersely distributed in the tissue as the parameters. The intervals flucatuate. Therefore, an average value and/or a degree of fluctuation is calculated and is displayed. For obtaining the average interval, a method of using the cepstrum of the received signal or a method of using the self-correlation of the received signal can be used.