Match Filter Design for Improved Strain Estimation in Transient Elastography

Abstract- Ultrasonic transient elastography for tissue biomechanical parameters (such as shear velocity) measurement has significant clinical applications. The Youngs modulus, which represent the tissue stiffness, is a recognized indicator of many diseases such as liver fibrosis, breast cancer, can be directly calculated from the shear velocity. In order to estimate the shear velocity accurately, transient elastography usually requires a high signal to Noise ratio (SNR) in the region of interest (ROI). We designed a match filter to convolute with the estimated displacement in the time direction to boost the SNR of the displacement for a better strain image mapping. The convoluted result shows the match filter can significantly improve the strain image quality and help getting more accurate Youngs modulus estimation.