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Ultrasonic Attenuation Tomography Based on Log-Spectrum

Analysis
Radovan Jirk
a
, Rainer Stotzka
b
and Tornn Taxt
c
a
Dept. of Biomedical Engineering, Brno University of Technology, Kolejn 4, 61200 Brno,
Czech Republic;
b
Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe, Institute for Data Processing and Electronics,
HermannvonHelmholtz Platz 1, 76344 Eggenstein, Germany;
c
Dept. of Biomedicine, University of Bergen, Jonas Lies vei 91, N-5009 Bergen, Norway
ABSTRACT
The paper presents a new ultrasonic attenuation imaging method which might be used as a new imaging modal-
ity, targeted at breast cancer diagnostics. Two approaches based on ultrasonic imaging are combined together,
namely the estimation of ultrasound attenuation coecients from pulseecho Bmode imaging data and an
ultrasound computer tomography imaging technique. A recently published method for estimation of the ultra-
sound attenuation coecient using the logspectrum analysis is applied to radiofrequency signals acquired by an
ultrasound computer tomography system to estimate images of the attenuation coecients.
The examined volume (e.g. female breast) is enclosed by several thousand ultrasound transducers. Radiofre-
quency signals from all transducers using all sending positions are recorded. Compared to the known ultrasound
attenuation tomography methods, not only the directly transmitted signal, but also the reected and scattered
signals are processed here, i.e. substantially more information is used.
The method is presented in its initial stage. The applied algorithm is derived using simplifying assumptions
which will be relaxed in further research. However, even at this stage the resulting attenuation image is of higher
quality than the standard attenuation imaging methods applied to the same data set.
Keywords: Ultrasound attenuation tomography, ultrasound imaging, ultrasound computed tomography, atten-
uation imaging
1. INTRODUCTION
Ultrasound attenuation parameters of human tissues are closely related to their type and pathological state.
1
Therefore, estimated attenuation parameters can be used as a feature in quantitative tissue characterization.
This paper is focused on ultrasound attenuation imaging in breast cancer diagnosis. Breast cancer is the most
frequent cancer of women. For a successful therapy it is crucial to detect the tumor before external metastases
occur.
2
In breast cancer diagnosis, standard ultrasound B-mode examination provides useful additional diagnostic
information. However, interpretation of ultrasound images, e.g. discrimination of benign and malignant struc-
tures, is very dicult using conventional ultrasound imaging. This is because of poor spatial resolution and low
contrast.
Attenuation imaging may be an alternative imaging modality with high diagnostic value. There has been a
considerable interest in estimation of the ultrasound attenuation coecient for several decades.
Some attenuation estimation methods have been suggested for processing data acquired using standard B-
mode ultrasound imaging. Most methods are based on the downward shift of the mean frequency of the radiofre-
quency signal as a result of attenuation.
3, 4
So far, the available methods estimate the attenuation coecient
only in fairly large tissue regions.
Further author information: (Send correspondence to R. Jirk)
R. Jirk: E-mail: jirik@feec.vutbr.cz, Telephone: +420 541 149 557
Another approach to ultrasound attenuation imaging is based on ultrasound computed tomography setup.
The ultrasound pulse is emitted to the imaged object from various directions and the transmitted signal is
recorded. There have been developed several approaches to reconstruction of attenuation images, i.e. images
showing distribution of the local ultrasound attenuation coecient in the tomographic plane. They are based on
estimation of the attenuation coecient along a beam, i.e. an integral of local attenuation coecients in all points
along the beam. To compute an image of local attenuation coecients, the cumulative attenuation coecients
are used in a reconstruction algorithm, such as unltered or ltered backprojection.
5
In principle, there are
three approaches to estimation of the cumulative attenuation coecient: energy ratio method, spectral-shift
method and the method of log-spectral dierences.
In the energy ratio method,
6
the attenuation along the beam is estimated from the energy of the incident
pulse measured at the receiving transducer and from the energy of the pulse emitted to the imaged volume. The
emitted pulse can be measured by the receiving transducer with no imaged object present, only water e.g. (by
neglecting the attenuation of water). This method is applicable to a narrow-band pulse. The use of wide-band
pulses requires additional corrections.
6, 7
Spectral-shift methods
7, 8
assume Gaussian-shape spectrum of the transmitted pulse and linear dependence
of the attenuation coecient on frequency. The attenuation along the beam is calculated from the shift of the
mean frequency (centroid) in the received pulse with respect to the emitted pulse. Correction for non-Gaussian
spectrum shape of the pulse can be done e.g. using an algorithm described in.
7, 9
The method of log-spectral dierences
7, 10
is based on the log-spectra of the emitted and received pulse. The
dierence of these functions corresponds to the dependence of the attenuation coecient along the beam on
frequency. Mostly, a linear dependency is assumed. Then, the estimated attenuation coecient corresponds to
the slope which can be obtained by least-mean-squares tting of a linear function to the dierence log-spectrum.
The major artifacts in ultrasound attenuation tomography are caused by phase cancellation and refraction.
Phase cancellations occur when the phasefront of the received pulse is distorted or at non-normal incidence
(caused by refraction). As the electrical signal on the receiving transducer is proportional to the integral of
the acoustic pressure across the transducer surface, the variations in phase of the received pressure eld cause
degradation. This problem can be solved by using phase-insensitive transducers
10
based on an acoustoelectric
eect. Another approach is to use transducers with low dependence of response on the angle of incidence (small
size transducers).
The refraction eect diverges the beam so that the transmitted signal hits the receiver only partly or misses
it. To avoid the problem, larger transducers or 1-D, 2-D transducer arrays are used to increase the receiving
transducer aperture.
8
The current ultrasound attenuation tomography methods are based on processing of the directly transmitted
pulse, i.e. only the a short segment of the received radiofrequency signal, corresponding to the direct transmission.
In our approach, longer radiofrequency signals are recorded and processed. Thus, not only the directly transmit-
ted signal is used, but also scattered and reected signal is taken into account. The scattering and reection of
ultrasound beam is considered a source of useful signal instead of a source of distortions. This approach utilizes
more information than the above mentioned methods. However, a substantially more complex reconstruction
problem has to be solved. An initial stage of the approach is presented. It is based on a method originally derived
for standard B-scan images.
11, 12
It enables estimation of ultrasound attenuation coecients using log-spectrum
representation of overlapping radiofrequency signal segments. For B-mode images the estimates of attenuation
coecients were of fairly high variance, enabling reliable estimation only within large regions. Application of the
algorithm in computed tomography results in attenuation maps of fairly good resolution. This is made possible
because a much larger amount of data is available in ultrasound computed tomography. The presented algorithm
is derived using simplifying assumptions. The imaged attenuation values are not exactly the local attenuation
coecients. They are shifted to the mean attenuation coecient within the whole image. However, even at this
stage, the resulting image clearly shows the imaged phantom object without any signicant geometry distortion
obtained by standard backprojection methods.
2. DATA ACQUISITION
The presented method of ultrasound attenuation tomography is derived for a setup, where the imaged object,
immersed in a water tank, is enclosed by a ring of transducers. One transducer is in the emitter mode, while all
other transducers record the received radiofrequency signals. Then, the next element is selected as emitting and
all remaining transducers as recording, and so on until all transducers have been used as emitters.
The emitted pulse is an undirected beam in the tomographic plane. Thus, the pulse spreads as a spherical
wave in this plane. In the direction normal to the tomographic plane the pulse is supposed to be narrow. Such
transmitted elds can be approximately achieved by a transducer with a small crossection in the tomographic
plane and focused to this plane. The recorded radiofrequency signals are long enough to contain the directly
transmitted signal and also the signal reected and scattered from the imaged structures in the tomographic
plane.
3. MODEL OF RADIOFREQUENCY SIGNAL
A model of the recorded radiofrequency signal is derived and simplied to become tractable in this initial study.
First, a model for B-mode imaging signals is reviewed. Let us consider a short segment of the radiofrequency
signal of one beam b (Fig. 1a). Furthermore, a homogeneous tissue of a constant attenuation coecient is
considered. The spectrum of the segment can be modeled as
11, 12
S
b
(, d) = G() R(, d) e
2d|

2
|
e
i(,d)
. (1)
In this model, d is the distance between the ultrasound probe and the given region. G() describes the electrical
signal applied to the input of the transducer and the electroacoustical round-trip transfer function of the trans-
ducer. R(, d) is the tissue characterizing function describing the distribution of scatterers and reectors causing
echoes in the considered radiofrequency signal segment. It is a highly irregular composite function of position
and frequency.
13
R(, d) is often modeled as random signal of zero mean value. The exponential functions
represent the round-trip frequency response (response on both ways of the pulse propagation: from the probe
and back) of the tissue between the transducer and the position at depth d along the beam. The tissue transfer
function is mainly due to attenuation. The rst exponential factor is the amplitude response of the attenuation
eect. is the frequency dependent attenuation coecient of the homogeneous tissue. Linear dependence on
frequency is assumed, which is approximately valid for soft tissues.
14
Because the attenuation takes place on
both forward- and back-propagation of the ultrasound signal, the width of the attenuating medium is 2d. The
second exponential factor denotes the phase response of the attenuation eect.
15
For heterogeneous tissues, is the mean attenuation coecient between the transducer and the point at
depth d on the beam path. Denoting l the trajectory of the pulse through the attenuating medium, i.e. the path
transducer point at depth d on the beam transducer, the mean attenuation coecient can be expressed as
=
1
2d

hl
(h)dh. (2)
For the data acquisition using the computed tomography setup, the above given model can be used with a
slight modication. Only a 2-D model will be considered, meaning that all reections and scatterings taking
place out of the tomographic plane are neglected. For any combination of the sending transducer s and receiving
transducer r, a radiofrequency signal segment corresponding to the directly transmitted pulse (Fig. 1b) can be
expressed in the frequency domain as
S
s,r
(, l) = G() e
l|

2
|
e
i(,l)
. (3)
l is the distance between the sending and receiving transducers. The factor G() now includes the electrical
excitation of the sending transducer and the electroacoustic transfer functions of the sending and receiving
transducers. It can be estimated using a measurement with only water in the tank. In case of ideally undirected
beam, it is constant for all directions of the emitted and incident wave. is the mean attenuation coecient
along the line l.
(a)
(b)
(c)
Figure 1. Principle of the radiofrequency signal models (assuming constant ultrasound propagation speed c). (a) B-mode
imaging. (b) Computed transmission tomography imaging. (c) Computed tomography imaging based on reection /
scattering (sparse reectors / scatterers assumption).
To model a radiofrequency signal segment corresponding to non-straight propagation, let us rst consider a
few reectors or scatterers in the imaged object in the tomographic plane (Fig. 1c). Assuming that the signal
of the segment corresponding to the path l
1
+ l
2
is formed only by reection at one reector or scatterer, the
segment spectrum can be expressed as
S
s,r
(, l
1
+ l
2
) = G() e
(l1+l2)|

2
|
e
i(,l1+l2)
, (4)
where is the mean attenuation coecient of the path l
1
+ l
2
.
In reality, the imaged tissue consists of many reectors / scatterers, so the segment signal is always caused by
reection / scattering from many such points. Thus, the segment signal can be expressed as a sum of all waves
propagating a trajectory of the same length (assuming a constant speed of ultrasound propagation):
S
s,r
(, l) =

k
T
k
G() e

k
l|

2
|
e
i
k
(,l)
. (5)
T
k
is a reection / scattering coecient of the given point on the k-th wave path. It describes the level of
the reected / scattered signal at this point. Frequency independence of the eect is assumed.
k
is the mean
attenuation coecient along the k-th wave path. Only one reection / scattering is considered. Second and
higher order reections or scattering are neglected. The energy of the signal decreases with every reection /
scattering. So it is reasonable to assume that after second reection / scattering the energy is negligible.
Furthermore, including these eects in the signal model would substantially increase the complexity of the image
reconstruction problem.
4. ATTENUATION IMAGE RECONSTRUCTION
The attenuation image is formed based on estimation of the mean attenuation coecients in the log-spectrum
domain. First, the signal processing is described for B-mode imaging. The radiofrequency signals of all beams
are divided into short overlapping segments. Each segment is then transformed to the log-spectrum domain by
applying logarithmic transform to the amplitude of its spectrum (Eq. (1)):
log|S
b
(, d)| = log|G()| + log|R(, d)| 2d|

2
|. (6)
The transducer characterizing term log|G()| can be either modeled as a parabolic function (corresponding to
a Gaussian-shaped amplitude spectrum
4, 11, 12
) or measured, e.g. as a reection at a at surface. Knowing the
estimate of log|G()|, it can be subtracted from log|S
b
(, d)| to form a modied log-spectrum:

S
b
(, d) = log|R(, d)| 2d|

2
|. (7)
The modied log-spectrum is a sum of of a linear function of frequency and an irregular function of random
character, corresponding to log|R(, d)|. The mean attenuation coecient is the slope of the linear component
divided by 2d. The slope is estimated by least-mean-squares tting applied to the modied log-spectrum.
Because the spectrum of the radiofrequency signal is of low energy in low- and high- frequency bands far from the
mean transducer frequency, the least-mean-squares tting is applied only to a band around the mean frequency.
The useful band can be estimated experimentally from observing the modied log-spectra as the frequency band
with linear trend. This way, the mean attenuation coecient is estimated for each segment of each beam. These
estimates then form the nal mean-attenuation image.
For the ultrasound computed tomography setup, a similar procedure can be used. For each combination of
the sending and receiving positions, the radiofrequency signal is divided to short overlapping segments. The
segments are transformed to the modied log-spectrum in the same way as for B-mode imaging. The modied
log-spectrum is assumed to be a linear function of frequency (in the band around the transducer mean frequency)
in case of segments corresponding to the direct pulse transmission (Eq. (3)). It is also a valid assumption for the
segments corresponding to the case of sparse reectors / scatterers in the imaged medium (Eq. (4)). In general,
for complex media, e.g. human tissue, Eq. (5) has to be considered, meaning that the modied log-spectrum
is not a linear function. It is a logarithm of a sum of exponentials, which is in case of Eq. (5) a monotonously
decreasing function. Applying least-mean-squares tting to such segments anyway, gives a slope estimate which
is a result of contributions of attenuation along the wave paths of the corresponding length. High attenuation
along a wave path decreases the slope estimate for the segment (note that the slope is negative), while low
attenuation increases it.
The attenuation image is formed using the following algorithm. For each pixel of the attenuation image,
all combinations of the sending and receiving transducers are used. For each combination, one segment of the
radiofrequency signal is selected, which corresponds to the reector / scatterer position at the given pixel. Given
the position of the pixel, sending and receiving transducers, the considered wave path consists of two lines, one
connecting the sending receiver with the pixel and the other connecting the pixel with the receiving transducer.
Assuming a constant speed of ultrasound propagation, the radiofrequency signal segment is found by calculating
the time corresponding to the wave path length. Then, the slope within the segment is estimated, multiplied
by 1 and divided by the length of the wave path, giving a mean attenuation estimation, which includes the
contribution of the given pixel.
The estimates of such mean attenuation coecients for all sending-receiving transducer combinations are
cumulated. In the end, the mean of the cumulated values is calculated. A high number of the cumulated values,
results in low variance of the estimates. It should be noted that the contribution of other pixels is not averaged
out because their mean value is not zero. Instead, the resulting estimates of the local attenuation coecients are
shifted to the mean attenuation coecient in the complete image. Nevertheless, such image can be still valuable
for qualitative assessments because pixels from higher attenuating regions should always give higher values than
the pixels from lower attenuation regions.
In unltered backprojection technique, the cumulative attenuation estimates (corresponding to the mean
attenuation coecient along a directly transmitted beam) is cumulated to all pixels of the resulting image along
the beam. Subsequently, the average of the cumulated values is computed for each pixel. The approach is
equivalent to the new attenuation-imaging method described in previous paragraphs, if the mean attenuation
coecients were cumulated only for pixels along the directly transmitted beams, not for all pixels of the resulting
image.
5. EXPERIMENTAL SETUP
A prototype data acquisition device, developed at Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe, was used.
16, 17
It enabled
recording of transmitted, reected and scattered signal within the tomographic plane in the imaged object. The
system consists of two commercial 16-element transducers immersed in a water tank. One transducer was used
as source of emitted ultrasound pulse. The other transducer was used as receiver, whereas the radiofrequency
signal of each element was recorded. Both transducers can be independently positioned on a ring (diameter 12
cm) to emulate a ring of transducers enclosing the imaged object in a water tank. In the experimental setup,
the ring was divided into 100 equidistantly spaced positions. The sending transducer was successively placed
to each position. For each sending position, the receiving transducer was placed to the remaining positions and
the received radiofrequency signal was amplied and recorded. Altogether about 100 000 radiofrequency signals
were recorded.
The frequency of the emitted ultrasound pulse was 2.5 MHz as a compromise between high ultrasound
absorption and low resolution due to high wave length. Sampling frequency was 10 MHz, quantization 12 bits.
The testing data were recorded on an articial object,
18
(Fig. 2). It consists of a plastic box with a lid.
The inner space is divided into four compartments by a plastic lm separator. Each compartment is lled with
gelatine with dierent concentration of contrast agent.
The transducers frequency response G() was estimated for each element separately to compensate for dier-
ent characteristics of the elements. The function was measured on the tank lled only with water. In the image
reconstruction algorithm, the slope of the modied log-spectrum was computed for each element of the receiving
transducer and averaged to give the slope estimate for the given segment of the sender-receiver transducers
combination.
Figure 2. Drawing of the testing phantom object
(a) (b)
Figure 3. B-mode image (crossection of thigh). (a) Standard B-mode image, (b) Mean-attenuation image.
6. RESULTS
For illustration, rst a result of the algorithm is given for a standard B-mode image of the thigh crossection
(Fig. 3a). The resulting mean-attenuation image (Fig. 3b) shows unclearly some structures, e.g. the outline of
femur in the lower part of the image. However, the values have a very high variance due to inaccurate estimation
of the slope in the modied log-spectra.
For the computed tomography setup an attenuation image was rst calculated using standard algorithms.
The energy ratio method (described in Section 1) was used to calculate the cumulative attenuation coecient
projections. Unltered (Fig. 4a) and ltered (Fig. 4b) backprojection
5
was used, i.e. the images were formed
only from the directly transmitted pulse.
The unltered backprojection reconstruction gave a better image than the ltered one, concerning the phan-
tom outline and the homogeneity of the water area. Because of high attenuation of the phantom walls, many
transmission signals could not be detected and had to be interpolated. The resulting artifacts were more pro-
nounced in the ltered backprojection.
The attenuation image computed using the new algorithm is shown in Fig. 4c. The image shows fairly
well the outline of the phantom object. In contrast to the backprojection image, the geometry is without any
signicant distortion. An ideal attenuation image would be dark in areas around the object, corresponding to
negligible attenuation of water. Here, the regions close to the object border are evidently aected by higher
(a) (b) (c)
Figure 4. Computed tomography setup, image of phantom. (a) Standard unltered backprojection algorithm. (b)
Standard ltered backprojection algorithm. (c) Mean-attenuation image using transmission reection and scattering.
attenuation of the phantom. It comes from the fact that for pixels close to highly attenuating regions, most of
the radiofrequency signal segments used for their pixel value estimation contain also contributions coming from
the high attenuation regions. This eect occurs also in unltered backprojection (see Fig. 4a). To a smaller
extent the attenuation image is also blurred due to the length of the radiofrequency data segments.
The resulting image (Fig. 4c) shows higher attenuation of the phantom walls. Furthermore, the inner gelatine
content is also relatively bright, meaning higher attenuation, compared to the water regions. The dierence in
attenuation between the compartments of the phantom object is not easy to interpret because, at the current
stage, the dierence in attenuation coecients caused by dierent contrast agent concentrations is not available.
With the applied algorithm it is not possible to resolve reliably changes in attenuation coecient within this,
probably fairly small, range.
7. CONCLUSION
A new approach to ultrasound attenuation tomography has been presented. Compared to the current techniques,
it does not only use the directly transmitted ultrasound pulse to estimate the attenuation crossection image.
The reected and scattered ultrasound signal is also taken into account and is treated as an additional source of
information. Hence, the approach assumes also non-straight trajectory of the wave propagation, which increases
the complexity of the image reconstruction problem.
A model of the recorded radiofrequency signals has been proposed. A simplied version of the model was
used to design an algorithm for computation of attenuation images. The resulting images do not directly show
the local attenuation coecients. The estimated values are shifted to the mean attenuation coecient of the
whole image.
Testing the proposed technique on data acquired on an articial phantom object showed that the attenuation
image reconstructed the object geometry fairly accurately without any signicant distortions observed on images
obtained using standard backprojection reconstruction. The attenuation properties of the phantom were well
visible, in spite of the blurring artifacts caused by the simplifying assumptions made in derivation of the algorithm.
The presented attenuation imaging method was originally developed for B-mode images. The resulting B-
mode mean-attenuation images were of poor quality due to high variance of the estimates. However, applying
the algorithm to ultrasound computed tomography data gives much better results because of high redundancy
of the data (approximately 100 000 radiofrequency signals available in the computed tomography setup instead
of about 100 signals in the B-mode imaging).
The algorithm is not intended to give exact ultrasound attenuation-coecient images. Rather it has been
designed as an initial stage of a research project aimed at using reected and scattered signal in ultrasound
attenuation tomography. The results indicate that there is a big potential in the approach.
In the future, radiofrequency data will be acquired on a phantom object with precisely known ultrasound
attenuation coecients. To estimate correct local attenuation coecient maps, new methods will have to be
derived based on a more complete model of the radiofrequency signal (Eq. (5)). This will lead to a problem
similar to the classical ltered backprojection or to solving of a huge set of linear equations. However, not only
the straight-line propagation will be considered.
A challenging task is to nd an analogy to the ltered back-propagation technique which would be applicable
also to non-straight lines of the wave propagation. This would avoid solving a huge set of overdetermined linear
equations which is, for the current problem, extremely big to be solved using the available computing power.
These more complex methods should also allow compensation for deviations from ideally undirected transducer
beam characteristics. Furthermore, more general wave propagation trajectories will be considered, than only
one reection / scattering as assumed here. This will also take the refraction eect into account, which was not
considered in the current algorithm.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The project has been supported by the joint program of the German Academic Exchange Service and Czech
Academy of Science (grant. no. D-CZ 22/05-06), by the Czech Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports (grant
no. 1K03017) and by the Czech foundation Nadani Josefa, Marie a Zdenky Hlavkovych.
We are also very grateful to Adam Filipik (Brno University of Technology) and Nicole Ruiter (Forschungszen-
trum Karlsruhe) for their valuable contribution.
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