SISTEMA DE IMAGINERIA ACUSTICA CON RED DE FASE LINEAL DINAMICAMENTE FOCALIZADA

EL SISTEMA DE IMAGEN ACUSTICO, TIENE UNA SERIE DE N-TRANSDUCTORES CONCERTADOS PARA TRASDUCIR SEÑALES ELECTRICAS, TRANSMITIENDOLAS EN PULSOS ACUSTICOS Y PARA TRANSDUCIR PULSOS DE RESONANCIA ACUSTICA, EN SEÑALES RECEPTORAS ELECTRICAS; MEDIANTE UN TRANSDUCTOR MULTIPLICADOR CONECTADO CICLICAMENTE CON UN GRUPO ADYACENTE DE M-ELEMENTOS TRANSDUCTORES, MEDIANTE UN CONJUNTO DE CANALES DE RECEPCION O TRANSMISION IDENTICOS. CADA CANAL INCLUYE CAMBIOS INTERMEDIOS DE FASE, QUE PROPORCIONAN UN ENFOQUE DINAMICO, POR UN CONJUNTO DE RELOJES DE FASE INDIVIDUALES. LAS ORDENES DEL CONTROL DESMULTIPLICADOR CONECTAN UNO DE LOS DIFERENTES REJOJES DE FASES, CON EL MEZCLADOR DE CADA CANAL, EN UN ORDEN CICLICO DE CONEXIONES TRANSDUCTORAS, POR EL TRANSDUCTOR MULTIPLICADOR, DE GRUPOS DE M-ELEMENTOS TRANSDUCTORES ADYACENTES SELECCIONADOS PARA FORMAR LINEAS ACUSTICAS QUE ATRAVIESAN LA ORDEN DE ENTRADA. An acoustic imaging system having an array of N transducers arranged for transducing transmit electrical signals into acoustic pulses and for transducing acoustic pulse echos into electrical receive signals has a transducer multiplexer that connects in substantially cyclic order any one of a selected group of M adjacent transducer elements to one of a plurality of substantially identical transmit or receive channels. Each channel includes phase changing means for dynamic focusing, such as a mixer (28) driven by one of a plurality of individually phased clocks (C1-M). A control demultiplexer (15) orders connection of an appropriate one of the differently phased clocks to the mixer of each channel in an order precisely corresponding to the cyclic ordering of the transducer connections by the transducer multiplexer as groups of M adjacent transducer elements are selected to form acoustic scan lines stepped across the entire array.