Patent ID: 8023359
Filing Date: 2011-09-20
Classification: G06T

Abstract:
1. An ultrasound system, comprising: an ultrasound emitter and detector element configured to emit ultrasound waves and detect ultrasound reflections to generate polar-coordinate image data, the polar-coordinate image data being divided up into an (N×M) array of polar-coordinate image data blocks, each of the polar-coordinate image data blocks being defined by a block angular range selected from N possible angular ranges, and a block radius range selected from M possible radius ranges; a first external memory element configured to store the (N×M) array of the polar-coordinate image data blocks; a second external memory element configured to store x-y coordinate image data corresponding to the polar-coordinate image data; and a video processing chip, comprising wherein N, M, and R are all integers greater than 1, wherein R is less than M, and wherein an internal access time or latency for the internal memory element is shorter than an external access time or latency for the first external memory element.