Patent ID: 11911219
Assignee: KONICA MINOLTA, INC.
Field: Medical technology (Instruments)
Classification: CPC A | IPC A

Claim 11:
12. An ultrasonic probe of an ultrasonic diagnostic apparatus that generates an ultrasonic image of a subject, the ultrasonic probe comprising:
a transducer unit that performs transmission and reception of ultrasonic waves;
a stepping motor that moves the transducer unit;
a motor controller that sends a drive signal of a microstep drive method to the stepping motor;
an encoder that detects rotational motion of the stepping motor, and generates a detection signal having a pulse train shape depending on an amount of rotational displacement per unit time of the stepping motor; and
a digital arithmetic circuit that detects each rise or fall of a pulse of the detection signal, detects each rise or fall of a microstep of the drive signal when the stepping motor rotates to obtain a number of microsteps of the drive signal, and generates high-resolution position data in which a resolution of first position data of the transducer unit obtained from the detection signal is increased by using the first position data obtained from the detection signal and interpolating the first position data of the transducer unit at a timing between the detections of each rise or fall of the pulse of the detection signal with the number of microsteps of the drive signal as a reference.