Coherent Multi-Transducer Ultrasound Imaging: First in vivo results

Despite medical ultrasound being ubiquitous in clinical practice, its usefulness is limited by low resolution images with a restricted field of view and penetration depth. Those key limitations, which are especially prevalent when imaging deep in the body and are more pronounced in an increasingly obese population, reduce sensitivity of diagnostic ultrasound. Fundamentally, these limitations are constrained by the extent of the transmitting and receiving apertures. Recently, we have developed coherent multi-transducer ultrasound (CoMTUS), which allows the use of multiple ultrasound arrays as one large effective aperture, to overcome known limitations and improve the ultrasound imaging performance. In this study, CoMTUS feasibility for in vivo imaging is tested, for the first time, in a foetal phantom and in vivo in a healthy adult volunteer. Preliminary results show that, in comparison to a single-probe image and to the fused image obtained combining the two images independently acquired by both arrays, CoMTUS leads to improved images with an extended field of view and more detailed structures.