Time to market is critical to medical products. A few months after the product release time will have a significant impact on the project's return on investment (ROI), which may result in lost revenue or miss the best time to market. However, on the other hand, medical imaging system developers must also use the latest technology to give the system excellent analog performance, composite signal processing and visualization, and use high-speed analog-to-digital converters (ADCs) and more channels to obtain Higher data throughput.
The need to use the new technology while requiring a fast time to market, poses a huge challenge to product design. However, some of the new tools are now available to help engineers quickly turn new designs into prototypes and get the best performance from their systems. These tools help developers use imaging reconfigurable field-programmable gate array (FPGA) technology and application-oriented integrated analog front end (AFE) combined with a flexible integration platform for faster imaging system prototyping. Developers can now combine modular FPGA hardware, integrated AFEs, advanced design tools, and industry-standard platforms to build highly flexible, scalable, and customizable imaging systems.
Case study - 3 months to create a prototype of the ultrasound imaging system
Diagnostic Sonar, a UK-based company, presented a concept for a new phased array ultrasound imaging system. Designed for off-the-shelf FPGA hardware and application-specific integrated AFETs, and using advanced design tools, they used a total of "3 months" from determining the architecture to manufacturing a prototype system capable of displaying real-time ultrasound images. Thanks to off-the-shelf modular FPGAs and AFE hardware build systems, the development team was able to build their first prototype system in such a short period of time. This approach is extremely flexible and has customizable features that allow development teams to focus on aspects of ultrasound processing algorithms and I/O interfaces that require more expertise.
Figure 1 Diagnostic Sonar builds its ultrasound imaging system prototype using the PXI platform
FPGAs have a lot of design flexibility, allowing developers to experiment with new ideas and reduce the risk of early system development. Because the FPGA can be reconfigured through software, designers can save development time and be able to program the FPGA to accommodate certain changes while demonstrating hardware-based processing that was not originally thought of when designing the product specifications.
One of the challenges of using FPGAs for prototyping is that programming a system with a traditional hardware description language (eg, VHDL, etc.) is a time consuming task that lengthens the project's planned timeline. However, some recent developments in development tools have allowed us to use advanced graphics tools for overall system design, making FPGA programming more efficient. Where appropriate, it can use existing VHDL IP (Xilinx CORE GeneratorTM, internal development, third parties, etc.). When used correctly, these tools enable very fast prototyping system development so that both algorithm and hardware performance can be evaluated and improved.
Diagnostic Sonar's development team used National Instruments' tools to create a prototype of the system. These tools include NI FlexRIOTM modular FPGA hardware programmed with LabVIEWTM FPGA components, a graphical design language for designing FPGA circuits without the knowledge of VHDL coding. NI FlexRIO combines interchangeable, customizable I/O adapter components and a user-programmable FPGA component into a single PXI or PXI Express chassis. The Virtex family of Xilinx FPGAs is used on the board to achieve I/O and signal processing performance for applications such as medical imaging. Diagnostic Sonar used to develop boards using FPGAs, but now NI FlexRIO is more appealing to them because they want to make prototypes using familiar, good hardware that already includes many I/O connections, PCI Express bus interfaces, and The basic component of DRAM communication. Developing these components internally can take a lot of time and shifts the attention of developers so that they can't concentrate on product innovation, and the greatest added value of the product is innovation.
Figure 2 NI FlexRIO is a product example that combines a user-programmable FPGA with a highly integrated TI AFE with customizable I/O
Once Diagnostic Sonar decided to build its system prototype using the off-the-shelf modular FPGA architecture using NI FlexRIO, the next step was to define the system's I/O. The NI FlexRIO platform has a variety of analog and digital adapter components to meet many application needs, but it also allows system developers to design their own custom I/O and connect to the FPGA using the Adapter Component Development Kit (MDK). Diagnostic Sonar has experience in designing ultrasonic front ends. However, they realized that to achieve the channel density requirements for optimal system performance, they had to use a fully integrated AFE specifically designed for ultrasonic applications.
Developing higher performance systems with integrated AFEs Ultrasonic system performance is greatly affected by its analog circuitry. Therefore, every feature of the AFE is critical to all ultrasound system designs.
The ultrasonic system's AFE consists of a low noise amplifier (LNA), voltage controlled attenuator (VCA), programmable gain amplifier (PGA), graphics fidelity filter (AAF), and analog-to-digital converter (ADC). The LNA provides the low noise amplification needed to achieve good sensitivity. VCA and PGA are part of the Time Gain Control (TGC) module to improve the dynamic range of the system. In addition, they allow the gain to increase over time in order to compensate for the increased signal attenuation as the signal passes through the body. The amplified signal is then filtered to improve its signal to noise ratio (SNR). The resulting signal is then converted to a digital format by an ADC and processed by a receive beamformer. The performance of the AFE greatly drives the evolution of ultrasonic system characteristics, making it smaller, lighter, longer battery life and higher image quality.
Process selection is a key consideration for semiconductor manufacturers before starting IC design. Process selection must balance performance, power consumption, cost, and upgrade feasibility.
Regardless of whether the design is for a high-end car or a handheld portable system, AFE channel integration is important. Portable system developers must save as much board space as possible, and high-end systems must be optimized for high channel counts. In the past five years, AFE has grown rapidly. In 2004, designing a 16-channel AFE using discrete methods required more than 40 components. Now, only 2 are needed!
The development of semiconductor process technology has enabled us to reduce size, power consumption and overall performance. Some of today's AFEs, such as TI's AFE5808, have doubled performance, reduced board space by 94%, and reduced power consumption by 67%. The higher channel integration in AFE devices allows for a much smaller size, fewer component counts, and a simpler layout – all of which ultimately make the system more cost effective and shorter time to market. .
Figure 3 Application-specific analog front ends have greatly improved integration and performance over the past few years
Integration of ultrasound system components
Many designers' applications require the highest performance AFE to be used as much as possible, while Diagnostic Sonar considers using the NI FlexRIO MDK to build its own design around the latest AFE. However, in the end they all realized that they could use the high performance provided by TI's AFE5801 to implement their applications. The AFE5801 has 8 channels and provides a CNC scan gain of -5Db to +31Db. They can use the NI 5752, a spot adapter component that integrates four such AFEs into a single 32-channel component with a sampling rate of 50 MS/s and a 12-bit resolution.
Using off-the-shelf components at the system's receiving end saves them a lot of development time so they can focus on hardware design: the 32-channel, high-voltage pulse generator component of NI FlexRIO (paired with the NI 5752). Prototyping with modular FPGA hardware allows them to quickly produce a working prototype system and determine which hardware changes need to be made because I/O is separated from the FPGA end. Since they all use modular FPGA boards to build their designs, their prototype system has only 32 channels, but with a simple adjustment to the frame, you can have 64, 128, 256 or even more (required 32) Multiple) The number of channels simultaneously used for transceiving, integrated multiplex function, and adapt to a variety of ultrasonic arrays. In addition, by using FPGAs for hardware signal processing, their signal processing can be adjusted based on how many channels are added by the system, without requiring the CPU to limit the imaging rate of the system.
On the software side, Diagnostic Sonar began using LabVIEW on the host to program algorithms—including beamforming, filtering, and reconciliation—and visualized the data using a graphical user interface (GUI). After the prototype system demonstration, they can use LabVIEW FPGA to move the algorithm to the FPGA on the NI FlexRIO board to further improve signal processing performance. Finally, Diagnostic Sonar created a high-performance, multi-channel ultrasonic acquisition and processing system using modular FPGA hardware and graphics software. The system can be adapted and customized for a variety of applications. These technologies allow them to offer their customers a variety of options, from a standard system configuration that can be used immediately, or from a single company with system integration capabilities (eg 32-channel pulse generator, custom) Array connection and beamforming IP, etc.).
The end result - adjustable and customizable system
Diagnostic Sonar is a small company, but they leverage the signal processing capabilities and reconfigurability of FPGAs and the superior analog performance of TI's ultrasonic AFE to create an ultrasound system that can be easily adjusted and customized. In addition, they completed the prototype demonstration of the initial system in a very short period of time (only 3 months) using off-the-shelf custom hardware.
In short, this demand will continue to grow. Major medical system development companies need to use a variety of methods to integrate next-generation technologies into their products and to implement new innovations in their products. Diagnostic Sonar and many other companies are using the same design approach, leveraging FPGAs and AFEs to help enable these innovations in next-generation imaging systems.
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