Plane Wave Imaging for ultrasonic non-destructive testing: Generalization to multimodal imaging.

Area of Science:

• Materials Science
• Engineering
• Physics

Background:

• Non-Destructive Testing (NDT) requires advanced imaging for defect detection.
• Medical Plane Wave Imaging (PWI) offers fast ultrasound acquisition.
• Total Focusing Method (TFM) is the established NDT imaging standard.

Purpose of the Study:

• To adapt the medical Plane Wave Imaging (PWI) technique for Non-Destructive Testing (NDT).
• To achieve fast ultrasound imaging with high image quality for defect characterization.
• To generalize PWI for immersion setups and multimodal imaging (direct, half-skip).

Main Methods:

• Plane waves transmitted at multiple angles, with back-scattered signals recorded by all array elements.
• Receive focusing achieved via coherent summation of signals within the region of interest.
• Adaptation of PWI for immersion testing using water coupling and multimodal wave propagation.

Main Results:

• The adapted PWI method demonstrates good agreement with the reference Total Focusing Method (TFM).
• PWI requires three to ten times fewer transmissions compared to TFM for comparable results.
• Effective detection of various defects, including inclusions, porosities, and cracks, was achieved.

Conclusions:

• The generalized PWI technique is a viable and efficient alternative to TFM for NDT.
• This method enhances speed and maintains image quality in ultrasonic array imaging.
• PWI offers a promising advancement for NDT applications, particularly in immersion and multimodal scenarios.