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Utilizes Reflection of Harm-less UltrasoundMusic, dogs barking, telephones ringing- we are enveloped by sound. Not onlyis sound harmless to us, but life withoutit would be very difficult. Using sound toinvestigate the human body as an aid tomedical treatment is the role of the ultra-sound diagnostic system. However, thesound exploited by these systems isultrasound with a frequency of 1 to 10megahertz (1 to 10 million hertz), farabove the human audible range of 30 Hzto 20,000 Hz. Despite the high frequen-cy, the properties of ultrasound are fun-

damentally identical to audible sound itis harmless to humans, it requires somemedium for transmission, and its speeddepends on the transmission medium.Ultrasound reflects from objects assound echoes from mountains. An ultra-sound diagnostic system is based onultrasound reflecting off of objects. However, although ultrasound reflects offof objects, it does not reflect randomly.Each substance has an intrinsic propertycalled acoustic impedance, which is thedensity of the substance multiplied bythe speed of sound in that substance.Sound is reflected from the boundarybetween materials of different intrinsicacoustic impedance. The degree ofacoustic reflection depends on the differ-ence in intrinsic acoustic impedance: anextremely large difference in acousticimpedance results in almost all soundbeing reflected, while a very small differ-ence causes virtually no reflection.

Position Detected from TimeDifferences in ReflectedUltrasound WavesWhy is this difference so useful in imaginga fetus floating in the amniotic fluid of thewomb or for the internal organs of thebody? A ratio of ultrasound waves trans-mitted through the amniotic fluid arereflected from the border between amni-otic fluid and fetus namely from the bodysurface of the fetus while the remainderof the ultrasound is transmitted throughthe fetal organs. Some of the ultrasoundtransmitted through the fetus is reflectedfrom the next boundary, the other side ofthe body of the fetus, and the remainderis transmitted into the amniotic fluid. By

detecting these two ultrasound reflec-tions, the thickness of the fetus' body atthe position of ultrasound incidence canbe calculated from the time difference. Across-section image of the fetus' bodycan then be created by arranging thethickness at each organ and tissue onthe mother body, obtained from adetailed ultrasound scan. This is theprinciple behind ultrasound diagnosticsystems, which generate a fine ultra-sound beam to reveal fine details aboutthe body of the fetus. Recently, systems using ultrasoundreflection have also been used in auto-mobiles to detect obstacles. Almost allultrasound is reflected from an obstacledue to the extremely large difference inintrinsic acoustic impedance between itand the air. Although obstacles can bedetected only at certain distances, thesystems is satisfactory for an automobileobstacle detector.

Blood Flow MovementsDetected by Applying theDoppler EffectThe Doppler effect with sound is wellknown. It is the phenomenon thatmakes the siren of an approachingambulance or the roar of an approachingcar sound high, while the same soundsproduced by a retreating ambulance orcar sounds lower. The movement of thesound source results in a higher or lowerfrequency where the sound is heard, andthe higher the speed of the soundsource, the greater the difference insound pitch. The Doppler effect occursalso when sound is reflected a factexploited by the blood flow display func-tions of ultrasound diagnostic systems.When blood flows away from the ultra-sound receiver/generator, the frequency

Explores the Interior of the Human Body with "Sound"Finer ultrasound beam and sophisticated signal processing create high-definition, real-time displays of blood flows and heart movements.

New Product

Digital Color Ultrasound Diagnostic System

SDU-2200

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of the reflected ultrasound is lower thanthe frequency of the generated ultra-sound. A greater frequency differenceindicates a higher blood velocity, and thecolor ultrasound diagnostic system cancolor-code the display to indicate thecurrent blood flow status. A region ofpoor blood flow due to thrombosis orsome other problem is displayed in a dif-ferent color to other regions.

Technology Supports HighDiagnostic CapacityThe Color Ultrasound Diagnostic Systemdisplays a cross-sectional image of livingtissue, based on the concepts above,and superimposes the blood flow move-ments onto this cross-sectional image. Good diagnostic performance requiresthat an ultrasound diagnostic systemhave a resolution high enough to vieweven the smallest lesion, and a framerate high enough to capture instanta-neous blood flow abnormalities andkinetic abnormalities of the heart. Thelatest ultrasound diagnostic systems

incorporate a digital beam former thatfocuses down to the size of the con-stituent pixels of the image to createhigh-resolution cross-section images.The diagnostic efficiency is enhanced byboth the real-time imaging achieved withdedicated LSIs developed specifically forthe system, which use simultaneous

reception of reflected ultrasound signalsfrom four directions and other tech-niques to improve signal processingspeed, as well as by a frame rate highenough to capture instantaneous abnor-malities in blood flow.

Medical diagnostic systems demand notonly these basic technologies, but mustalso deliver a high diagnostic capacity inall situations. Many image parametersare used by ultrasound diagnostic sys-tems to permit application across arange of diagnostic areas, including theheart, embryos, and the abdominalorgans. This function uses sophisticat-ed collaboration between hardware andsoftware to instantaneously set the hugenumber of parameters appropriate toeach diagnostic area.

The high diagnostic capacity achieved byvarious supporting functions and tech-nologies will likely make the Color Ultra-sound Diagnostic System a widely useddiagnostic system in the medical field.

Ultrasound wave oscillatedfrom the ultrasound diagnostic system.

Time difference of this reflected wave is measured and the thickness of the organ calculated.

A part of the wave isreflected.

Human organ

A part of the wave permeates the organ.

Fig. 1 Principle of capturing shapes such as human organsusing ultrasound reflection (schema)

Femoral artery and vein

Fetus

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Shimadzu has been selected to receivethe Minister of Education and ScienceAward in the 10th Annual World Environ-ment Awards sponsored by the JapanIndustrial Journal, one of Japan's leadingspecialist industrial newspapers. Theaward ceremony was held on April 18.The World Environment Awards honorenterprises and local authorities thatactively pursue environmental protectionactivities. Of 108 applicants, 10 corpora-tions, including Sony that received thelargest prize, and two local governmentauthorities were recognized. This is the second time Shimadzu hasbeen recognized with a World Environ-

ment Award, having received the 5th Sci-ence and Technology Agency DirectorGeneral's Prize.Shimadzu was awarded for contributionsto environmental protection on a globalscale, including environmental protectionwith analytical and measuring instru-ments, the active pursuit of environmen-tal management activities both inside andoutside the company, strong support forUN University environmental monitoringand analysis projects in the East Asianregion, and the reduction of CO2 green-house gases by developing CO2 fixingtechnology.

Free Courses on ObtainingISO 14001 CertificationTackling EnvironmentalManagementShimadzu acquired ISO 14001 certifica-tion in 1997. The company activelystrives to cut factory noise, lower vol-umes of discarded paper, reduce powerconsumption, conduct product recyclingdesign, and promote green procurement.Shimadzu also offers free courses on

obtaining ISO 14001 certification for cus-tomers and industries, and undertakesenvironmental protection activities insideand outside the company.Since 1998, Shimadzu has run a total of 58courses, attended by over 2,500 people.

Shimadzu Receives Minister of Education andScience Award in the World Environment Awardssponsored by the Japan Industrial Journal

Award

Shimadzu Honored For EnvironmentalProtection Activities

Delighted CEOS including Shimadzu (second from the right in front row), Sony and others. The ceremony in the presence of the Prince andPrincess Akishinomiya of Japan.

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The initial stage of theproject from 1996 to1999 involved the stan-dardization of analyticaltechniques for monitoringthe concentrat ions ofchemical pollutants indrinking water, soil, food,and air in East Asia.The second stage from1999 to 2002 monitorsand analyses endocrinedisrupter compounds(EDCs) in the waterwaysand coastal areas ofEast Asia.

Shimadzu is continuing to provide thesame level of support for the secondstage as it did for the first, and in additionhas established joint laboratories at uni-versities in Vietnam and Malaysia, bothcountries participating in the project.

CO2 Fixing Technologyto Help Prevent Global WarmingCO2 is thought to be the major culpritbehind global warming. The world gen-erates six billion tonnes of carbon dioxidegas each year, of which Japan produces320 million tonnes. CO2 fixing is a meansof converting this troublesome gas intosomething useful, instead of simply dis-charging it into the atmosphere.The development ofthis technology startedwith research intomaintaining oxygenand water in space.This unique, previouslyunknown CO2 fixingmethod uses revolu-tionay technology toconvert the CO2

humans exhale in asealed space intooxygen and water.

Environmental Monitoringin ASIACooperation with UN UniversityProjectShimadzu has supported the "Environ-mental Monitoring and Analysis in theEast Asian Region" project since 1996 byfinancially supporting operating costs,providing analytical instruments, andoffering technical training.Shimadzu supports this project under itsoperational principle of Realizing OurWishes for the "Well-being of Mankindand the Earth." Nine countries partici-pate in the project: Japan, China, Singa-pore, Korea, Thai land, Indonesia,Malaysia, Vietnam, and the Philippines.Shimadzu has donated Gas Chromato-graph-Mass Spectrometers (GCMS) toeach participating country, and also runsa training workshop each year forresearchers at the organizations partici-pating in the international symposium.These workshops train the technical stafffrom each country to continuouslyacquire reliable environmental data andalso promote environmental databasecreation and personal networking.

The technology was jointly developedwith the Research Institute of InnovativeTechnology for the Earth (RITE), and veri-fication testing of the technology beganlast July at the Shizuoka Plant of one ofJapan's major breweries, Sapporo Brew-eries Ltd.The CO2 fixing system developed by Shi-madzu uses methane generated by theaction of micro-organisms on organicwaste products as the source of thehydrogen for CO2 fixing, and thus requiresonly about 1/10 the energy costs of previ-ously proposed CO2 fixing methods.The verification testing used biogas gen-erated in the brewery. The carbon pro-duced by the fixing process has a differ-ent crystalline structure and propertiesfrom carbon produced by conventionalmeans, and it may well find application asa new industrial material.Calculations show that applying this sys-tem to food processing plants and paperand pulp plants, which generate organicwaste similar to a brewery, could fixsome three million tonnes of carbon fromthe approximately seven million tonnes oforganic waste produced each year.Such a reduction would be a dramaticstep towards solving the greenhouse gasproblem.

Training workshop for UN University Project

At a lab in Sanjo Works.