Abstract: An ultrasonic diagnosis apparatus comprises an ultrasound probe, a transmitter (including a transmitting pulse generator and a transmitting beamformer), a receiver (including a preamplifier and a receiving beamformer), a CFM processor (including a moving-element signal extractor and a velocity corrector), a tomographic image processor, and a display unit. The apparatus scans a desired section of a subject by transmitting and receiving an ultrasound pulse to and from the subject, and displays images obtained by the scanning. The velocity corrector comprises a pulsation-characterizing-velocity (velocities of a moving element) calculator, a representative velocity (reference velocity) calculator, and a corrector to correct the velocities of the moving element based on the standard velocity. The corrected velocity data is visualized on display unit. The ultrasonic diagnosis apparatus makes it possible to display the pulsatility of blood vessels in an easier and useful way.

Abstract: An ultrasonic diagnosis apparatus comprises an ultrasound probe, a transmitter (including a transmitting pulse generator and a transmitting beamformer), a receiver (including a preamplifier and a receiving beamformer), a CFM processor (including a moving-element signal extractor and a velocity corrector), a tomographic image processor, and a display unit. The apparatus scans a desired section of a subject by transmitting and receiving an ultrasound pulse to and from the subject, and displays images obtained by the scanning. The velocity corrector comprises a pulsation-characterizing-velocity (velocities of a moving element) calculator, a representative velocity (reference velocity) calculator, and a corrector to correct the velocities of the moving clement based on the standard velocity. The corrected velocity data is visualized on display unit. The ultrasonic diagnosis apparatus makes it possible to display the pulsatility of blood vessels in an easier and useful way.

Abstract: A diagnostic ultrasound apparatus is provided for obtaining an image of an object into which an ultrasound contrast agent is injected. The apparatus has a transducer 1 for transmitting and receiving an ultrasound wave to and from the object and transmitting means (2, 81, 83) transmitting an ultrasound pulse into the object by driving the transducer under a first transmitting condition exerting a given destruction capability on the ultrasound contrast agent and a second transmitting condition having a destruction capability lower than that of the first condition. First image producing (3, 5) receive an ultrasound echo of the ultrasound pulse transmitted under the first transmitting condition and produce a first color-displayed image based on phase displacement information about the ultrasound echo. Additionally, second image producing means (3, 4) receive an ultrasound echo of the transmitted ultrasound pulse and produce a second image based on amplitude information about the ultrasound echo.

Abstract: In a high-resolution flow mode, a diagnostic ultrasound apparatus and a diagnostic ultrasound method that provide an image of blood flow or perfusion is provided with higher sensitivity and high resolution, which makes it possible to precisely observe the presence of fine blood vessels. In this apparatus, by scanning means (81 to 83), with a ultrasound pulse having a wideband frequency characteristic transmitting at least two times in the same direction within an object, a cross section to be imaged therein is scanned to obtain an echo signal at each time of transmission. By processing means 84, highpass filtering or differential processing is performed with rows of data in the time axis direction of an echo signal acquired at each sample location in the cross section, so that signals from blood flow are extracted. By producing means 85, the processed signals are produced into data of luminance or power.

Abstract: An ultrasound imaging apparatus and method in which an ultrasound signal is transmitted a plurality of times in each scanning direction and its echo is received. A Doppler signal detected from a group of echo signals consisting of a train of sequential Doppler data for each spatial sample position in each scanning direction. The amount of instantaneous changes in a phase of a clutter component included in the Doppler signal is estimated, the clutter component occurring due to reflection of the ultrasound signal from an organ. A phase of the Doppler signal is corrected using the estimated amount of instantaneous changes in the phase. A constant value corresponding to the clutter component is subtracted from the Doppler signal of which phase is corrected, information representing a blood flow is extracted based on the Doppler signal of which clutter component is removed and the extracted information is displayed in color.

Abstract: A bloodstream velocity image is formed by scanning a two-dimensional region including a blood vessel in a body to be examined with an ultrasonic wave. A velocity profile is formed by distributing either one of average velocities and maximum velocities of bloodstream velocities at a plurality of positions arranged along a first direction, along a second direction which is perpendicular to the first direction and extending across the blood vessel. A bloodstream volume is calculated from the velocity profile and a blood vessel diameter. Thus, an error caused by movement of a blood vessel accompanying pulsation can be decreased.

Abstract: An ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus including a probe which transmits a burst wave of ultrasonic pulses into a target in a body and receives reflected echo signals, a transmission unit which drives the probe, a receiver which delays the echo signals from the probe by delay times substantially equal to the delay times in the transmission unit, 2D image processing unit which performs predetermined processing on the output signals from the receiver in order to indicate a tomographic image, a Doppler-mode processing unit which performs predetermined processing on the output signals from the receiver in order to indicate the frequency spectrum of the received signals, a display unit which displays each processed result from the a 2D image processing unit and the Doppler-mode processing unit, a sample volume setting device which designates an observation region (sample volume) such as observation length (spatial length of the sample volume) and observation location (sample volume depth) to obtain a Doppler shift fre

Abstract: In response to heartbeat signals produced by an ECG adapted to detect heartbeats of a subject, an ROI (region of interest) of the subject is scanned plural times to produce a plurality of frames of Doppler image information. In this case, the starts of the scans of the ROI are sequentially delayed from corresponding heartbeat signals in increments of a regular time interval. Each frame of image information is stored in a frame memory in the form of divided sub-frame signals. Corresponding sub-frame signals of the frame signals are read from the frame memory and then synthesized to reconstruct one frame image.