High resolution and high contrast ultrasound mammography system with heart monitor and boundary array scanner providing electronic scanning

摘要

A synthetic four sided boundary scanner has an electronically switched line array of transducer elements of transducer element on each side of a boundary array scanner, in an ultrasound mammography system. Projector and hydrophone elements are alternately provided in the four line arrays for randomized paired switching operation during a scan of a breast subvolume. Electric signals generated by the hydrophone elements are processed to provide image data for the whole breast volume after sequenced scanning of the breast subvolumes is completed. A breast scan is performed in a sequence of periods within the time between a patient's heartbeats, with synchronization enabled by a heart monitor.