A brief history of ultrasound
The 1970s proved to be a great decade for ultrasound as many new developments came about including:
- Continuous wave Doppler
- Spectral Wave Doppler
- Color Doppler
Steps in the development of ultrasound
1912 – invention of hydrophone
A-mode ultrasound
B-mode ultrasound
“water path” scanner
pan scanner
compound compact scanner
1954 – M-mode scanner, capable of detecting motion
opthalmic ultrasound
1970’s and 80’s – development of scan converters making gray-scale imaging possible, mechanical sector scanners, multielement transducers, therapeutic transducers, focused high-intensity transducers
1794 – Lazzaro Spallanzani – First studied echolocation in bats
1877 – Jacques and Pierre Currie were the first to discover piezoelectricity. Ultrasound transducers or probes receive and emit sound waves by using the piezoelectric effect.
1914 – Reginald Fessenden came up with the first working ultrasound machine
1915 – Paul Langevin and and Constantin Chilowsky invented a hydrophone, which was referred to as the “first transducer”
1948 – George D. Ludwig, M.D., an Internist at the Naval Medical Research Institute, developed A-mode ultrasound equipment to detect gallstones.
From 1949 to 1951, Joseph Holmes and Douglas Howry pioneered the invention of B-mode ultrasound equipment. This included the 2D B-mode linear compound scanner. In addition, John Wild and John Reid created a handheld B-mode device during this time, which was used to help detect breast tumors.
In 1953, Inge Elder, a physician and C. Hellmuth Hertz, an engineer, became the first to perform an echocardiogram using an echo test control device.
1957 – Pan-scanner developed
Most credit Dr. Ian MacDonald with the invention of ultrasound. Dr. MacDonald was the first to incorporate ultrasound into the OB/GYN field of medicine in 1958.
In 1966 when Dennis Watkins, John Reid and Don Baker created pulse Doppler ultrasound technology. This new technology allowed for imaging of blood flow throughout many layers of the heart.
The 1980s was the decade when the first 3D ultrasound technology was created. It was invented by Kazunori Baba from the University of Tokyo. The first 3D image of a fetus was taken in 1986.
During the 1990s, the adoption of 4D capabilities became possible and ultrasound guided biopsies started to surface.
CME Science: Who Invented Ultrasound
Transducer design for imaging systems has undergone significant evolution over the years, from simple fixed single crystals to mechanically scanned elements and now to a variety of multielement arrays—linear, phased, annular, curvilinear, 2D, and so forth.31 The older single-element and mechanically scanned transducers had a fixed focal depth determined by the transducer design. Internally focused transducers relied on either a curved active element or a curved internal mirrored surface to provide a focal point.
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/8756479315618207#_i5
Pioneers in the development of ultrasound
1790 – Lazzaro Spallanzani first discovered that bats maneuvered in flight using their hearing rather than sight
1826- Jean-Daniel Colladon discovered sonography using an underwater bell, successfully and accurately determining the speed of sound in water.
1940s, Dr Karl Dussik in Austria ——the first physician to use ultrasound in medical diagnosis.
1949 – Douglass Howry, an American radiologist, develops a pulse-echo ultrasonic scanner using spare parts from radio stores and surplus radar equipment from the Air Force. A year later Howry uses a 35mm camera to record the pictures of the ultrasound.
1951 – Howry et al demonstrated the first clinical 2D B-mode image
William J. Fry – Pioneer in the field of therapeutic ultrasound who first used computers in diagnostic ultrasonography and neurosonic medical imaging to detect disease.wikipedia.org]
Malte Hinselmann, using the Vidoson, demonstrated in 1969 the universal visualization of fetal cardiac action from 2 weeks onwards
In collaboration with cardiologist Paul Hugenholtz and local dutch company Organon Teknika, they produced in 1972 the ‘Multiscan System’, notably the earliest commercial linaear array scanner in the world, mainly aimed at cardiac invetigations.
The History of Ultrasound
The history and evolution of diagnostic ultrasonography has been founded on the combined efforts of physicists, engineers, computer scientists, doctors, sonographers, physiologists, university researchers, as well as large commercial companies and individual entrepreneurs.
HealthManagement, Volume 19 – Issue 2, 2019
Future of ultrasound: where are we going?
https://healthmanagement.org/c/healthmanagement/issuearticle/future-of-ultrasound-where-are-we-going
the advantages and challenges of implementing the different types of ultrasound simulators
the first success for the introduction of a simulator will be to demonstrate that using these models effectively teaches the very basic aspects of ultrasound to a competent level. The second hurdle will be to acquire these simulators. They will involve an initial forward investment, and people have to put capital costs out there to get the simulators in place, and then use them.
the potential to using virtual reality and gamification for training and education
It’s in the early stages, but the technology and the software is there from all the other aspects that physicians use it for and it’s going to inevitably be applied to training for ultrasound. It’s coming.
REFERENCES:
A short History of the development of Diagnostic Ultrasound in Japan
A short History of the Real-time ultrasound scanner
The Evolution of Ultrasound
https://academic.oup.com/ehjcimaging/article/6/1/7/2367221
https://ultrasourcemedical.com
Melissa Genovese: Journal of Diagnostic Medical Sonography
CME Science: Who Invented Ultrasound
https://academic.oup.com/ehjcimaging/article/6/1/7/2367221