Three-dimensional beamforming combining micro-beamformed RF datasets

Abstract

A general challenge in 3D volumetric imaging is the large channel count. One solution uses integrated microbeamformers. The reconstruction of the entire volume from these micro-beamformed datasets can be performed in many ways. In this paper we propose two 3D multiline beamforming techniques, suitable for producing volumes at high frame rate and compare the image qualities to a fully-sampled matrix. The performance of the proposed beamforming techniques was evaluated with simulations in FieldII. Results show that the proposed simple volume reconstruction technique (using 25 transmissions) produces volumes at very high frame rate, but with sharp intensity changes within the volume. The proposed advanced technique (using 169 transmissions) produces volumes very similar to a fully-sampled matrix transducer despite the micro-beamforming.