A new transducer could dramatically lower the cost of ultrasound scanners
1–10 of 38 posts
Re: A new transducer could dramatically lower the cost of ultrasound scanners
#2This would be great for animal husbandry. So much guesswork and tracking of schedules would be unnecessary if a veterinarian weren't required e.g. to determine follicle size. I will buy three or four, when they're $100.
Re: A new transducer could dramatically lower the cost of ultrasound scanners
#3Ok, that is just awesome. There are a ton of uses for low cost ultrasound from trauma care to package inspection.
Re: A new transducer could dramatically lower the cost of ultrasound scanners
#4Great, now instead of simply googling my symptoms, I can also attempt to read an ultrasound. Image search maybe?
Re: A new transducer could dramatically lower the cost of ultrasound scanners
#5The thing looks pretty fragile -- one of the reasons why they use piezo based systems is they are pretty robust.. I guess I am not clear how this system equates to getting a $100 ultrasound machine.. I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say this system probably is not going to replace normal ultrasound systems for some time.. but could be used to wrap one of these membranes around say your heart and have something like an implantable ultrasound heart monitor..
Re: A new transducer could dramatically lower the cost of ultrasound scanners
#6We'll see if they ship!
The company that is really killing it in this space right now is https://www.butterflynetwork.com/
Re: A new transducer could dramatically lower the cost of ultrasound scanners
#7Paired with deep learning it would be very helpful for early tumor screening at home. My girlfriend already had cancer twice, but the usual screening is done only once every 6 months.
Re: A new transducer could dramatically lower the cost of ultrasound scanners
#8The thing looks pretty fragile -- one of the reasons why they use piezo based systems is they are pretty robust.. I guess I am not clear how this system equates to getting a $100 ultrasound machine.. I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say this system probably is not going to replace normal ultrasound systems for some time.. but could be used to wrap one of these membranes around say your heart and have something lik…
Sorry, can I have some explanation on how piezo-based ultrasound systems aren't considered fragile? Even within their casing, dropping or banging one risks damaging the crystals.
Using Philips Lumify, Clarius' C-3, and other transducers, I think we've seen a bit of what low cost ($1k - $10k range) ultrasound machines with the same form factor can do to the market. Rather than displace the whole market, low cost ultrasound created a new fragment and opened doors for more clinicians and more clinical applications. The higher end machines are still regularly used and sought after (you can't really get the image quality and amazing beamforming otherwise).
I do like the idea of implantable ultrasound heart monitor! Fun to think about.
Disclosure: one of the co-inventors in the article was my graduate supervisor. I had no relation with this work however.
Re: A new transducer could dramatically lower the cost of ultrasound scanners
#9For the extra keen, here is the Nature Microsystems & Nanoengineering paper about this work released Aug 27 2018:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41378-018-0022-5
Disclosure: one of the co-inventors in the article was my graduate supervisor. I had no relation with this work however.
Re: A new transducer could dramatically lower the cost of ultrasound scanners
#10This would be great for animal husbandry. So much guesswork and tracking of schedules would be unnecessary if a veterinarian weren't required e.g. to determine follicle size. I will buy three or four, when they're $100.
I would too, for the same reason and for other “paravet” diagnostic work on my unit.
That said, in cattle I found (with a bit of vet coaching) it wasn’t hard to recognise follicles, distinguish from (and gauge size of) a corpus luteum, etc by manual palpation, at least for someone who AIs reasonably regularly anyway.
Our vets seem no less accurate this way than with their expensive heads-up toy! (I doubt I’m as accurate - I don’t get anything like the practice they do - but very handy for quick sanity check.)