Patent ID: 8045777

Claim:
A method for ultrasonic imaging, comprising: transmitting ultrasonic radiation toward a target and receiving the ultrasonic radiation reflected from a region of the target so as to define a main reflected signal and an auxiliary reflected signal having different, respective main and auxiliary beam patterns; taking a difference between the main reflected signal and the auxiliary reflected signal so as to generate an output signal containing a reduced level of clutter in comparison with the main reflected signal organizing a magnitude of each of the main reflected and output signals into two dimensional arrays; establishing a y axis of a cell range and an x axis of a cell angle; determining at least one two-dimensional block defined by at least three cells along the y axis and by at least three cells along the x axis; defining a center cell within each at the least one two dimensional block; and determining a mean magnitude of the at least one block and calculating a ratio between the mean magnitude of the at least one block and the magnitude of the center cell for each of the magnitude of the main reflected signal array and the magnitude of the output signal array.