DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Claim Objections
Claims 1-3 and 5-7 objected to because of the following informalities:
Claim 1 recites the limitations “a phase of acquiring signals representative of the movement”, “the medium”, “estimating images of movement…. and a static deformation component”, “determining said and at least one property of the medium” should read “a phase of acquiring signals representative of a movement”, “the viscoelastic medium”, “estimating images of movement…. and the static deformation component”, “determining the at least one property of the medium”.
Claim 2 recites the limitation “finite impulse response filter the characteristics” should read “finite impulse response filter characteristics”.
Claim 3 recites the limitation “the shear component … the shear component” should read “the shear propagation component … the shear propagation component”.
Claim 5 recites the limitation “the shear component” should read “the shear propagation component”.
Claim 6 recites the limitation “an excitation having the form of a low frequency” should read “an excitation having a form of a low frequency”.
Claim 7 recites the limitation “the highpass type” should read “a highpass type”.
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 4, 7, and 9 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Claim 4 recites the limitation "the minimum and maximum velocity" in line 2. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 7 recites the limitation " wherein the finite impulse response filter is of the highpass type in a useful frequency range comprised between 0 and 50 m-1”. The term useful frequency range is not a standard term of the art and is not defined in the claim. It is unclear whether this range corresponds to the passband, stopband, or some other operational range of the filter. The examiner is interpreting the limitation as range of frequency corresponds to the passband filter.
Claim 9 recites the limitation “wherein the lowpass filter is a rectangular window lowpass filter or a filter whose impulse response is such that its maximum value is less than or equal to 2 times its average value” it is unclear what is the maximum value or the average value of the filter means. The examiner questions if the maximum value referrers to the cutoff boundary of the filter, maximum response of the filter, or frequency passed by the filter?
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claim 1 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Mellema et al. (NPL: “Probe oscillation shear elastography (PROSE): A high frame rate method for two dimensional ultrasound shear wave elastography”).
Regarding claim 1, Mellema teaches an analysis method for analyzing a region of interest of a viscoelastic medium, the analysis method including a phase of acquiring signals representative of the movement of at least one shear-propagation component and of a static-deformation component, the acquisition phase comprising the following steps (Abstract; Probe Oscillation Shear Elastography (PROSE) as an alternative method to measure tissue elasticity. PROSE generates shear waves using a harmonic mechanical vibration of an ultrasound transducer, while simultaneously detecting motion with the same transducer under pulse-echo mode. Motion of the transducer during detection produces a “strain-like” compression artifact that is coupled with the observed shear waves.):
emitting acquisition signals in the viscoelastic medium successively over time (fig. 1, methods section (part A); To generate shear wave motion, a custom vibration system was created, coaxially mounting a linear voice coil actuator (BEI Kimco Magnetics, Vista, CA) to an L11-4v linear array ultrasound transducer (Verasonics Inc., Kirkland, WA) for use with a Verasonics Vantage Ultrasound system (Verasonics Inc., Kirkland, WA). A function generator (Agilent 33250A, Agilent Technologies, Inc., Santa Clara, CA, USA) was used to generate a sinusoidal driving signal for shear wave generation. This output was connected to an amplifier (Crown D150A, Crown Audio, Inc., Elkhart, IN, USA; voltage gain: 26 dB) before being delivered to the voice-coil vibration system. To generate shear waves, the vibration system was manually held with a single hand such that the transducer was in continuous contact with the tested object.), and
detecting and recording reception signals received from the viscoelastic medium, each reception signal being associated with a respective acquisition signal (method section (parts A-B); Shear waves are generated by the motion of the transducer in contact with the object’s surface. Shear waves were observed using standard pulse-echo detection. Thus, it is possible to acquire two symmetrically sampled shear wave images per cycle, one at the maximum and one at the minimum of the transducer position. To accomplish the desired detection timing, a miniature accelerometer (ADXL335, Analog Devices, Norwood, MA) was mounted on the transducer. Ultrasound detection timing was adjusted such that the detection events occurred symmetrically around the maximum and minimum transducer displacement, with the time between two sequential detection events (Δt) empirically set as 1/10th of the vibration period.),
wherein the analysis method further comprises a processing phase for determining at least one property of the medium, said processing phase comprising the following sub-steps ( method section (parts C-E); Once the shear wave motion was acquired using the symmetric detection scheme and particle velocity data was obtained using the autocorrelation process. A sixth order Butterworth band-pass filter was applied to each frame to remove spatial wavelengths representing shear wave speeds outside a predetermined physiological range (cutoffs corresponding to 0.5–10 m/s).):
determining images of the region of interest of the medium from the reception signals, each image being determined from a respective reception signal and comprising information representative of the region of interest at different times (fig. 2, method section (parts B and E); The generated motion can be observed using a standard pulse-echo detection. However, the detected motion is comprised of three separate components: 1) the compressional wave generated by the harmonic vibration of the transducer, 2) the shear waves generated in the same fashion, and 3) a compression artifact caused by transducer motion relative to the imaged tissue. This compression artifact arises from transducer compression from the surface producing deformations within the object similar to deformation in quasi-static compression elastography. Fig. 2 illustrates how this effect arises when the transducer is moved by Δz between two consecutive detection events. Because the LFE requires the Fourier Transform, wave motion was mirrored in the two spatial dimensions to reduce the rippling effects in k-space due to discontinuous edges in the spatial domain. The resulting images were processed using LFE to estimate the spatial wavelength at each pixel. ),
estimating images of movement by comparing images of the region of interest, each movement image including information representative of the shear-propagation component and a static-deformation component (fig. 2, method section (part C); Because the probe is continuously moving, each steering angle will capture a slightly different image, resulting in blurring of the final compounded images. However, it has been previously established that as long as the transmission sequence is identical, causing identical blurring patterns in each of the compounded images, the underlying motion can still be successfully recovered using standard motion calculation methods [31]. The spatial pixel resolution of the image was one ultrasound wavelength (0.246 mm), and resulting field-of-view (FOV) of the investigated medium was 45.8 × 38.4 mm. Particle velocity was computed from the in-phase/quadrature (IQ) data of consecutive frames utilizing a one-dimensional autocorrelation method [32]. A three pixel spatial window was used for averaging in the autocorrelation process, and a 3 × 3 pixel spatial median filter was used to remove spurious noise from the resulting shear wave motion signal.),
filtering the images of movement to attenuate the static-deformation component (method section (Part D); nce the shear wave motion was acquired using the symmetric detection scheme and particle velocity data was obtained using the autocorrelation process. A sixth order Butterworth band-pass filter was applied to each frame to remove spatial wavelengths representing shear wave speeds outside a predetermined physiological range (cutoffs corresponding to 0.5–10 m/s). Because the shear wave propagation is primarily in the axial direction, motion propagating in the lateral direction was removed by filtering the corresponding spatial Fourier domain (k-space) components through the use of a rolled-off wedge filter), and determining said and at least one property of the medium from the filtered images of movement (method section; After motion demodulation, the two resulting motion frames were processed using spatial wedge and band-pass filters, and shear wave speed images were generated using LFE. A final estimate of the shear wave speed was obtained by averaging the two images obtained at the maximum and minimum displacement. The examiner notes that the properties of the medium are how elastic the medium or how stiff the medium is).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-9 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims. Additionally, the claims would be allowable if rewritten to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), 2nd paragraph, set forth in this Office action and to include all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter: the closest prior art of record as indicated in the office action fail to disclose or render obvious the methods of claims 2-9 thereof, when taken as a whole to include steps of applying a finite impulse response filter that has characteristics of which are defined according: to an average frequency of the shear-propagation component comprised between 10 Hz and 1500 Hz, and to a maximum group velocity of the shear-propagation component in the region of interest; wherein the finite impulse response filter comprises a passband and a stopband: the passband being defined at least by a lower bound K-6 said lower bound K-6 being equal to a ratio between the average frequency of the shear component and the maximum group velocity of the shear component, the attenuation in the passband being less than or equal to 6 dB, and the stopband being defined at least by a stop bound K-30 proportional to the lower bound K-6, the attenuation in the stopband being greater than or equal to 30dB, and the ratio between the lower bound K-6 and the stop bound K-3o defining a stiffness coefficient r of the finite impulse response filter, said stiffness coefficient being comprised between 1 and 4.5, wherein the finite impulse response filter is of the highpass type in a useful frequency range comprised between 0 and 50 m-1, and wherein said finite impulse response filter is obtained by combining an all-pass type filter and a lowpass type filter in said useful frequency range.
Mellema disclose filtering out static deformation component using a 6th order bandpass filter, however failed to teach using FIR filter that is defined by average frequency and maximum velocity, where the FIR filter comprises a passband filter, stopband filter, highpass filter, all pass filter, and a low pass filter.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ZAINAB M ALDARRAJI whose telephone number is (571)272-8726. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Thursday7AM-5PM EST.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Carey Michael can be reached at (571) 270-7235. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/ZAINAB MOHAMMED ALDARRAJI/Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3797
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