Introduction of Ultrasonic Imaging

Medical imaging has many modalities and most of themprovide clinicians with unique features of a
volume ofinterest (VOI) resulting from a chosen modality. Ultrasonicimaging is one technique for
collecting anatomical andphysiological information from within the human body.It can be used for
diagnosis (imaging) and for image-guidedtherapy, where therapeutic intervention can be appliedwith
direct image-based feedback. Other modalitiesinclude X ray (roentgen radiation), CT (computed
tomography),MRI (magnetic resonance imaging), PET or PET/CT (positron emission tomography), and
SPECT (singlephoton emission computed tomography).

In contrast tomost other imaging techniques, ultrasonic imaging is veryattractive to professionals
because it is cheap, real time(with>100 full frame images per second, >100 Hz), and ituses
nonionizing radiation. Moreover, current clinicalultrasound machines can be integrated into laptop
computerswith very little external hardware for maximum portabilityand versatility. These combined
features allow theuse of ultrasonic imaging in a wide variety of settings, fromprivate physician
practices, to ambulances with on-siteparamedics, to battle field situations, where very robustand
lightweight equipment is required. Many other uses ofultrasonic imaging are found in science and
industry theseinclude, for example, ultrasonic microscopy, nondestructivetesting and touch sensitive
screens.