Shamdasani Vijay, Managuli Ravi, Sikdar Siddhartha, Kim Yongmin
Department of Engineering and Electrical Engineering, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195, USA.
IEEE Trans Inf Technol Biomed. 2004 Jun;8(2):191-9. doi: 10.1109/titb.2004.828881.
Color-flow imaging is a well-established ultrasound mode and very valuable for visualizing in real time the distribution of blood flow in a specific region of interest. However, it is computationally quite expensive. To meet the large computational need in color-flow imaging, most ultrasound systems have been designed using fixed-function hardware. In this paper, we present a system where all the color-flow processing is supported on a programmable platform. About 95% of the processing modules were programmed in C language. On a single processor, we were able to achieve 7.9 frames/s, when the input data consist of 192 x 512 x 8 (ensemble size) samples for color flow and 384 x 512 for B mode and the output image size is 600 x 420. Additional processors can be added to handle more input data and/or support higher frame rates. Our results demonstrate that a programmable ultrasound system can provide the same functionality for clinical use as conventional ultrasound systems. However, it is more flexible and efficient due to its programmability.
彩色血流成像（Color-flow imaging）是一种成熟的超声模式，对于实时可视化感兴趣的特定区域内的血流分布非常有价值。然而，其计算成本相当高。为了满足彩色血流成像中的大量计算需求，大多数超声系统都采用固定功能硬件进行设计。在本文中，我们展示了一个在可编程平台上支持所有彩色血流处理的系统。约95%的处理模块用C语言进行编程。在单个处理器上，当彩色血流的输入数据由192×512×8（总体大小）个样本组成、B模式的输入数据为384×512且输出图像大小为600×420时，我们能够实现7.9帧/秒的帧率。可以添加更多处理器来处理更多输入数据和/或支持更高的帧率。我们的结果表明，可编程超声系统能够为临床应用提供与传统超声系统相同的功能。然而，由于其可编程性，它更加灵活高效。
