Use of Pulse-Echo Ultrasound Imaging in Transcranial Diagnostics of Brain Structures

The results are presented from computer simulations of acoustic pulse propagation in heterogenous media mimicking the human head in two-dimensional and three-dimensional geometries. In the three-dimensional experiment, the cranial bone is presented as a liquid layer with a speed of sound corresponding to that of longitudinal waves in the bone. In the two-dimensional experiment, both longitudinal and transverse waves are considered. Based on data obtained in the numerical experiments, the possibility of obtaining ultrasound images of point scatterers by compensating for aberrations introduced by cranial bones is studied. It is shown that even a simple time delay correction along straight rays greatly improves the quality of an ultrasound image obtained through a nonuniform-thickness solid layer.