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research article

Deep Learning-Based Inpainting for Sparse Arrays in Ultrafast Ultrasound Imaging

Viñals, Roser
•
Thiran, Jean-Philippe  
December 25, 2025
IEEE Transactions on Computational Imaging

Sparse arrays offer a promising solution for reducing the data volume required to reconstruct ultrasound images, making them well-suited for portable and wireless devices. However, the quality of images beamformed from a limited number of transducer elements is significantly degraded. This study proposes a deep learning-based inpainting technique to estimate complete radio frequency (RF) signals (before beamforming) from downsampled RF signals obtained using a subset of transducer elements. This approach allows for quality enhancement without the need to beamform images, offering flexibility particularly beneficial for applications such as speed-of-sound estimation algorithms. We introduce a model-based loss function that combines the signal and image domains by incorporating a measurement model associated with image reconstruction. We then compare this loss with another that accounts solely for the RF signal domain. Additionally, we train our network exclusively in the RF image domain, mapping images beamformed from downsampled RF signals to those from complete signals. We compare these approaches qualitatively and quantitatively, with all enhancing image quality. The proposed method with the modelbased loss achieves superior detail and quality metrics. Although trained on downsampled RF signals simulating sparse arrays in reception, all methods-especially our inpainting approach with the model-based loss-demonstrate strong adaptability to ultrafast acquisitions with reduced transducer elements in both transmission and reception. This highlights their potential for reducing the number of transducer elements in ultrasound probes. Furthermore, the proposed method exhibits superior generalization performance when evaluated on a different probe than the one used to acquire the training dataset.

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Type
research article
DOI
10.1109/tci.2025.3648531
Author(s)
Viñals, Roser

École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne

Thiran, Jean-Philippe  

École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne

Date Issued

2025-12-25

Publisher

Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)

Published in
IEEE Transactions on Computational Imaging
Start page

1

End page

16

Subjects

Convolutional neural networks

•

Deep learning

•

Image reconstruction

•

Inpainting

•

Sparse arrays

•

Ultrafast ultrasound imaging More Like This Simple Ultrasound Imaging System Based on Dense and Sparse Selection and Activation of Array Transducer Elements IEEE Access Published: 2025 Fast Image Reconstruction in the Frequency Domain for Row-Column-Arrays 2024 IEEE Ultrasonics

•

Ferroelectrics

•

and Frequency Control Joint Symposium (UFFC-JS) Published: 2024 Show More

Editorial or Peer reviewed

REVIEWED

Written at

EPFL

EPFL units
LTS5  
Available on Infoscience
December 29, 2025
Use this identifier to reference this record
https://infoscience.epfl.ch/handle/20.500.14299/257355
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