A Low-Power High-Dynamic-Range Receiver System for In-Probe 3-D Ultrasonic Imaging

Area of Science:

• Electrical Engineering
• Biomedical Engineering
• Signal Processing

Background:

• Capacitive micromachined ultrasonic transducers (CMUTs) are crucial for medical imaging.
• Existing ultrasound receiver circuits often face trade-offs between dynamic range and power consumption.
• In-probe digital beamforming requires efficient and high-performance receiver electronics.

Purpose of the Study:

• To design and implement a dual-mode, low-power, high dynamic-range receiver circuit for CMUT interfaces.
• To enable the development of advanced in-probe digital beamforming ultrasound imaging systems.
• To achieve a high dynamic range with minimal power sacrifice through flexible operation modes.

Main Methods:

• A novel dual-mode receiver chip was designed using a 65 nm CMOS process.
• The chip integrates a variable transimpedance amplifier (TIA) and an analog-to-digital converter (ADC) for gain control.
• A prototype with one receive channel was fabricated and tested.

Main Results:

• The test chip achieved an instantaneous dynamic range of 50.5 dB and an overall dynamic range of 72 dB.
• Low power dissipation was maintained, with an average power range of 60-240 µW at 30 MHz sampling frequency.
• The fabricated chip occupies a small area of 76 x 170 µm².

Conclusions:

• The designed dual-mode receiver circuit effectively enhances dynamic range while minimizing power consumption.
• This technology facilitates the development of compact and high-performance ultrasound imaging systems.
• The achieved performance metrics demonstrate the viability of the proposed receiver for advanced medical ultrasound applications.