The Ultrasound Visualization Pipeline

Abstract

Radiology is one of the main tools in modern medicine. A numerous set of deceases, ailments and treatments utilize accurate images of the patient. Ultrasound is one of the most frequently used imaging modality in medicine. The high spatial resolution, its interactive nature and non-invasiveness makes it the first choice in many examinations. Image interpretation is one of ultrasound´s main challenges. Much training is required to obtain a confident skill level in ultrasound-based diagnostics. State-of-the-art graphics techniques is needed to provide meaningful visualizations of ultrasound in real-time. In this paper we present the process-pipeline for ultrasound visualization, including an overview of the tasks performed in the specific steps. To provide an insight into the trends of ultrasound visualization research, we have selected a set of significant publications and divided them into a technique-based taxonomy covering the topics pre-processing, segmentation, registration, rendering and augmented reality. For the different technique types we discuss the difference between ultrasound-based techniques and techniques for other modalities.