Patent ID: 9060669
Filing Date: 2015-06-23
Classification: A61B,G01S

Abstract:
1. A method of analyzing movement of blood or anatomical structures or both within a region of interest, operating in conjunction with B-mode or color flow imaging modes or both, the method comprising: activating a transmit aperture within a multi-element transducer array; transmitting one or more ultrasonic beams along one or more scan directions that span the region of interest; for each transmit event, receiving ultrasound echoes from each element of a receive aperture; grouping the receive channel echo data into two or more sets corresponding to a first set of receive sub-apertures; combining each sub-aperture data set to generate partially focused echo-location data for one or more reconstruction lines; storing all the sub-aperture echo data sets during a storage period in a format that can be retrieved for later analysis, such that the stored, partially focused echo data sets are capable of being recombined according to a second, different set of receive sub-apertures; and determining a sound speed value by iteratively focusing data of two or more receive sub-apertures under different respective trial sound speed values.