ASIC Design for a Single-Cable 64-Element Ultrasound Probe

This paper presents an ASIC (Application Specific Integrated Circuit) design for a catheter probe that interfaces 64 piezoelectric elements directly integrated on top of the ASIC to an imaging system using a single micro-coaxial cable. Each of the piezo elements can be used for both transmit (TX) and receive (RX), enabling full synthetic aperture imaging. A prototype has been realized with a 1.5 mm diameter circular layout, intended for 3D intra-vascular ultrasound imaging. The functionality of this ASIC has been successfully demonstrated in a 3D imaging experiment. The design allows a single-element transducer to be replaced by a transdcuer array while using the same cable, making it a promising solution for 3D imaging with size constrained probes.