A sixteen-channel phased array driving system for ultrasound hyperthermia

A sixteen-channel driving system for ultrasound hyperthermia has been designed and constructed. This driving system was divided into two modules. Each module contained one main board and eight driving cards. The two modules were connected with a 64-wired flat cable. The main board had nine slots for the driving cards. Each driving card included phase shifter, amplitude controller, power amplifier and power switch. The serial port of a single-chip microprocessor (ATMEL 89C51) on the main board of the master module received the driving system instructions from PC. With these system instructions, the program in PC could select which channels would be turned-on or turned-off. Then, PC could control the power level and relative phase of turned-on channels. The bandwidth, power step, phase step, maximum output power, power stability within 100 minutes and relative phase error for each channel are 0.5-3.0 MHz, 256, 16, 18 Watts, 10% and 10%, respectively. This system can be extended if needed. Above all, this power driving system can be employed in multi-element transducers for ultrasound hyperthermia and other high power medical therapy techniques