Non-Local Super Resolution in Ultrasound Imaging

The resolution of ultrasound (US) images is limited by physical constraints and hardware restrictions, such as the frequency, width and focal zone of the US beam. Different interpolation methods are often used to increase the sampling rate of ultrasound images. However, interpolation methods generally introduce blur in images. Herein, we present a super resolution (SR) algorithm for reconstruction of the B-mode images using the information from the envelope of radio frequency (RF) data. Our method is based on utilizing repetitive data in the nonlocal neighborhood of samples. The performance of the proposed approach is determined both qualitatively and quantitatively using phantom and in-vivo data.