title: Versatile robotic probe calibration for position tracking in ultrasound imaging.
abstract: Within the field of ultrasound-guided procedures, there are a number of methods for ultrasound probe calibration. While these methods are usually developed for a specific probe, they are in principle easily adapted to other probes. In practice, however, the adaptation often proves tedious and this is impractical in a research setting, where new probes are tested regularly. Therefore, we developed a method which can be applied to a large variety of probes without adaptation. The method used a robot arm to move a plastic sphere submerged in water through the ultrasound image plane, providing a slow and precise movement. The sphere was then segmented from the recorded ultrasound images using a MATLAB programme and the calibration matrix was computed based on this segmentation in combination with tracking information. The method was tested on three very different probes demonstrating both great versatility and high accuracy.
authors: SINTEF Technology and Society, PO Box 4760 Sluppen, 7465 Trondheim, Norway. Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Faculty of Medicine, PO Box 8905, 7491 Trondheim, Norway. The Central Norway Regional Health Authority, PO Box 464, 7501 Stjørdal, Norway.
authors: Lars Eirik
authors: LE
authors: Bø
authors: Erlend Fagertun
authors: EF
authors: Hofstad
authors: Frank
authors: F
authors: Lindseth
authors: Toril A N
authors: TA
authors: Hernes
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D002138:Calibration; D019047:Phantoms, Imaging; D012371:Robotics / Q000295:instrumentation* / Q000379:methods; D014463:Ultrasonography / Q000379:methods / Q000592:standards*