A transducer assembly, suitable for medical examinations, for generating an apodized sector shaped beam of energy. A transducer in the form of a crystal, has a ring-like structure on its face which apodizes the signal produced by the transducer by providing a greater amount of attenuation at the transducer's periphery than at the transducer's center.

Essentially nonreflective coupling for ultrasonic waves is provided between a fluid medium confined in a rigid container and a biological specimen, such as a human body, through a container closing bellows system which incorporates a thin, flexible closing membrane that contacts and conforms to the contours of the specimen. A supportive bellows system between rigid parts of the fluid container and the membrane gives the membrane the essential properties of conforming to the contours of a specime...

A handheld, compact, self-contained transducer unit for electromagnetic generation and detection of ultrasound on or in metals and other media is realized by mounting short, flat cable sections directly on a small, powerful permanent magnet. The cable sections are interconnected in an electromagnetic transducer circuit configuration and the plane of the flat cable transducer circuit structure is perpendicular to the magnet magnetization axis. Fabrication of the device can be accomplished by sele...

Temporal variations in backscatter from an ultrasound contrast agent located in the vascular system and induced by movement of the scatterers are used to visualize the presence of contrast agent by determining areas where correlation between successive ultrasound images is poor. This low level of correlation from intravascular contrast agent movement permits distinction between stationary bulk tissue and moving bulk tissue since movement of the latter solid tissue scatterers is correlated.

A joint construction for joining an end cap and a pliant sheathing tube of an ultrasound probe of type including a rigid tip member supporting thereon an ultrasound transducer element and housed in the end cap together with the ultrasound transducer element, and a flexible rotation transmission shaft connected at the fore end thereof to the tip member to transmit rotation thereto and fitted in the pliant sheathing tube. According to the invention, the joint construction further comprises a metal...

An ultrasound catheter is disclosed for providing substantially real-time images of small cavities. The ultrasound catheter is characterized by separate and distinct materials for backing the transducers and for carrying the electronics components. The separate materials comprise an electronics carrier meeting the requirements for holding the integrated circuitry of the ultrasound device and a backing material displaying superior characteristics relating to reducing ringing and minimizing the ef...

An improved ultrasound probe includes a support member, a signal cable having a plurality of electrically conductive members and an ultrasound transducer array. Distal end portions of each of the conductive members may be separately embodied within and extend through the support member to a first side thereof. In turn, the ultrasound transducer array may be supportably mounted to the first side of the support member, wherein transducer elements comprising the ultrasound transducer array are elec...

Ultrasound bandages (10) and ultrasound transducer array bandages are provided herein to accelerate the healing of wounds by positioning the ultrasound bandages (10) and ultrasound transducer array bandages adjacent to a wound and generating ultrasonic pulses. The ultrasound bandages (10) generally include (a) a backing layer (12), (b) an adhesive layer (14) applied to, and substantially coextensive with the backing layer (12), and (c) a transducer material (16) disposed on at least a portion of...

Described and claimed is the combined use of an electric field and ultrasound to ablate a cell or tissue, the use of ultrasound to disrupt a nucleated cell which has previously been electrosensitised by exposure to an electric field, and the use of an electric field for sensitising a nucleated cell to ultrasound. We furthermore disclose the use of electricity to disrupt a nucleated cell which has previously been sensitised by exposure to ultrasound, and the use of ultrasound for sensitising a nu...

A method of delivering ultrasound signals includes providing an image of at least a portion of a subject intended to receive ultrasound signals between sources of the ultrasound signals and a desired region of the subject for receiving focused ultrasound signals, identifying, from the image, physical characteristics of portions of material between the sources and the desired region, and using a spectral propagation analysis to determine at least one of phase corrections and amplitude corrections...