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Revitalizing Medical Imaging With Ultrasound-On-a-Chip
catchblue22 writes: MIT Technology Review has an article about a device being developed by Butterfly Network that aims to make medical imaging dirt cheap. From the article: "Butterfly's patent applications describe its aim as building compact, versatile new ultrasound scanners that can create 3-D images in real time. Hold it up to a person's chest, and you would look through 'what appears to be a window' into the body, according to the documents. ... Most ultrasound machines use small piezoelectric crystals or ceramics to generate and receive sound waves. But these have to be carefully wired together, then attached via cables to a separate box to process the signals. Anyone who can integrate ultrasound elements directly onto a computer chip could manufacture them cheaply in large batches, and more easily create the type of arrays needed to produce 3-D images."
Would've been nice if TFA linked to the patent application, for the sake of completeness.
I remember another "Butterfly Something" company that also had a "Something-On-a-Chip" product, are they related?
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https://www.edx.org/course/uqx...
The course's contents is still accessible. "Episode 3" is about Ultrasound.
All videos from the course on Youtube (there is a lot more content on edX - text and images):
https://www.youtube.com/channe...
Look for "Brian has an Ultrasound" in that list (after loading all videos under that account) and go backwards (left and up) in the list for all videos on ultrasound.
The course/the videos are really interesting!
Given that Raspberry has just released an integrated screen module, this would seem to be a perfect fit for a system at a very low cost. Might not have the horsepower to support full 3-D goodies, but it would be a boon for areas with limited medical technology.
Just so the trolls have something to chew on, the wide availability of $10 ultrasounds in some cultures is leading to heavily-male sex selection.
I did this with my arduino a few years ago. Got the parts at Microcenter.
I expect to see opposition to this from some pro-choicers.
With the GOP back in power this will make it easy to get on the pre existing conditions black list.
Und vie rrrr going tu pump *kuchu* du up!
There was this recently: http://yro.slashdot.org/story/...
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
BUT WHY DOESN'T IT BEAM IT TO YOUR SMARTPHONE lN AN APP SO YOU CAN SHARE SCANS ON FACETWEET
these guys clearly know nothing about how to take a simple process and fuck it up
You keep using that word - but I do not think it means what you think it means.
The medical imaging industry seems to be going gangbusters already - it's not a field in need of revitalization.
#DeleteChrome
Folks this is a tricorder! I remember seeing a similar concept using micropulse radar, but it apparently did not pan out.
I am eligible to disable ads, and I've got the box checked... lo and behold, there's ADS ON THE FUCKING PAGE.
FUCK YOU DICE. DIE IN A FIRE.
(And yeah, dumbass me forgot to install noscript on this box... that's fixed now. Thanks for reminding me.)
The acoustic mismatch between soft tissue, bone, and lung guarantees that if you place a device like this against the chest you will not see “what appears to be a window." Unless, of course, you mean a window that has had boards nailed over it and a sheet covering half of it.
Sonography: Principles and Instruments by Frederick W. Kremkau, and Technology for Diagnostic Sonography by Wayne Hedrick are both excellent books that I highly recommend to the developers of this product.
That was my first thought. I recall seeing the tech do ultrasounds of my pregnant wife, and saying "see, there's the baby, and let's see, it's a girl/boy." I completely had to take their word for it; to me it was like looking at clouds. Admittedly that was a long time ago, maybe the technology is better now.
As for the FDA, I don't know that they should get involved; so long as it's marketed to the public as an interesting gadget/toy, rather than a medical tool.