Ultrasound Speed of Sound Reconstruction Based on Local Event Slopes of Synthetic Aperture Data

Sound speed estimation in medical pulse-echo ultrasound imaging is a critical area of research with profound implications for disease diagnosis. However, traditional methods, such as tomographic reconstruction and layered media modeling, either involve substantial computational complexity or fail to account for lateral sound speed variations. This study introduces a new, efficient method for sound of speed (SoS) estimation, rooted in local event slope analysis of common middle point (CMP) gathers within synthetic aperture ultrasound channel data. This method facilitates direct estimation of tissue sound speed distribution, thus providing valuable quantitative parameters for clinical evaluations. Distinctly, our method yields a higher resolution velocity spectrum compared to conventional stacking velocity spectra, and effectively manages lateral velocity variations, catering to clinical scenarios with lateral sound speed heterogeneities. Ultimately, our proposed technique holds significant potential for enhancing ultrasound imaging quality and diagnostic precision.