Abstract: As disclosed herein, a new and improved method and apparatus provides for the ensonification of at least a portion of a body part with acoustic energy pulses; detects the polarity and amplitude of the resultant echo pulse; and displays the detected data in a color television format to result in an improvement in resolution in indicia of tissue character. This improvement is accomplished by a process which simultaneously detects both the amplitude or strength of the echo pulse and the polarity sense of the echo pulse at the peak amplitude for each echo pulse. The improvement utilizes a general property of acoustical pulses to detect polarity and amplitude of the echo pulse. The amplitude and polarity measures of the echo pulse are used to produce intensity (luminance) and color (chrominance) throughout the body part for each individual picture element (pixel) forming the picture.

Abstract: Method and apparatus are provided for the determination of the Raylographic information of a body part which is ensonified by acoustical energy pulses by a particularly precisely focused acoustical focusing system to produce acoustical energy echo pulses which are detected in coherent manner. Fourier transformation of the pulses from the time to the frequency domain enables frequency domain deconvolution to provide the impulse response with minimization of mathematical instabilities and distortion of the frequency domain impulse response. Noise extraction and spatial deconvolution filtering are included to respectively maximize signal to noise ratio and minimize distortive effects of body part surface non-orthogonality and combine with the above to provide for particular stability in the overall results and attendant increase in the axial resolution of Raylographic display and in the overall resolution of body part image displays.

Abstract: Method and apparatus are provided for processing the successive echo pulses which result from the interrogation of a layered material by energy pulses, and include the direct provision from said echo pulses of the uncompensated coherent echo response of said material to thereby preserve phase information, the provision of the compensated impulse response of said material by modification of said echo response with a non-linear correction function, and the calculation of the RAYLOGRAM of said material from said impulse response. All of the above is accomplished in the complete absence of deconvolution, and said non-linear correction function includes a normalization factor to normalize the impulse response and provision for modifying the latter to compensate for energy pulse attenuation in the material to render it more accurate by satisfying the known boundary conditions of said layered material.