Saft Imaging in Anisotropic Media

Abstract

<p>In many practical applications, the ability to focus acoustic waves is of critical importance. A variety of techniques have been developed for this purpose. Typically, a physical lens is used for this purpose. However, with the advancement in digital signal processing techniques, electronic focusing methods are being utilized with increasing frequency. Prior research has demonstrated the utility of synthetic aperture techniques for increasing signal to noise ratios. This activity has been principally confined to isotropic applications. When anisotropic media have been considered, isotropic algorithms have been utilized despite the errors introduced by this simplifying assumption. Wave propagation in anisotropic media is significantly more complex than the isotropic case due to the directional dependence of material properties and beam skew phenomena. In this work, a SAFT algorithm, which properly accounts for anisotropy is developed.</p>