SHEAR WAVE GENERATION METHOD, SHEAR WAVE IMAGING METHOD AND THERMAL MAPPING OR TREATING METHOD UTILIZING SUCH A GENERATION METHOD AND INSTALLATION FOR GENERATING AT LEAST ONE SHEAR WAVE

摘要

This method for generating at least one shear wave in a target region of a soft solid, includes at least the following steps: a) generating (1002, 1004, 1006) at least one shear wave (SW₁, SW₂, SW₃) in the target region; b) detecting (1003, 1005, 1007) a propagation pattern (P1) of the least one shear wave in the target region; c) proceeding (1008) to a time reversal of the detected propagation pattern; and d) submitting (1011) the target region to an inverted excitation set of forces based on the temporally inverted propagation pattern. Step a) (1002, 1004) is implemented by generating at least two shear waves with at least a first source of shear waves (SW₁, SW'₁) and at least a second source of shear waves (SW₂, SW'₂). Step b) is implemented with a detector unit (10) which includes a row (10) of ultrasonic transducers (Ti) aligned on a first direction (X10) perpendicular to a detection direction (Di) of each ultrasonic transducer or a single ultrasonic transducer movable along a first direction (X) perpendicular to its detection direction. During step b), a first propagation pattern (P1) is detected (1003) when only the first source is active and a second propagation pattern (P2) is detected (1005) when only the second source is active. During step c), the first and second propagation patterns (P1, P2) are time-reversed (1008, 1009) independently from each other in order to generate, respectively, a first reverse excitation scheme (Ρ1') and a second reverse excitation scheme (Ρ2'). At step d), the first source is controlled (1011) with the first reverse excitation scheme (Ρ1') to generate at least a first modified shear wave (SW'₁) and, simultaneously, the second source is controlled with the second reverse excitation scheme (Ρ2') to generate at least a second modified shear wave (SW'₂), whereas the shear waves are focused at a given point of the target region.