Patent ID: 8083679
Filing Date: 2011-12-27
Classification: A61B,G01S

Abstract:
1. An ultrasonic image capturing apparatus for transmitting ultrasonic pulses from an ultrasonic probe in which elements are arranged two-dimensionally to a subject, receiving the ultrasonic pulses reflected by the subject, and capturing a slice image of the subject, comprising: a transmission beam former for forming a transmission ultrasonic beam from the ultrasonic pulses; a receiving beam former for forming a reception ultrasonic beam from the received ultrasonic pulses; a vector Doppler processor for detecting a motion of the subject along an aperture direction of the receiving beam former on the basis of an output result of the receiving beam former by a vector Doppler method; a displacement detector for obtaining a motion vector of a region of interest in the subject on the basis of a computation result of the vector Doppler processor; a scanning plane setting section for determining an image capture plane with ultrasonic waves on the basis of a motion vector of the subject; an envelope detector for performing detection from an output result of the receiving beam former; a scan converter for forming an image of a result of the envelope detector; and a display for displaying an output of the scan converter, wherein the transmission beam former transmits a beam to a transmission beam point on a scanning plane set by the scanning plane setting section, and the receiving beam former is set so as to make a focus on a point on the scanning plane set by the scanning plane setting section.