An Overview of Systems and Techniques for Autonomous Robotic Ultrasound Acquisitions

Ultrasound (US) acquisition in standard clinical procedures requires manual operation of the probe based on the interpretation of the image. A robotic system for autonomous US acquisitions holds great promise to relieve the workload of sonographers, improve access to care, yield more standardized imaging results, and circumvent the need for direct patient contact. In this paper, we provide an overview of the current status of systems and techniques for autonomous robotic US acquisitions in the literature. Specifically, we first present a framework to standardize the increasing levels of autonomy in robotic ultrasonography and briefly discuss the non-autonomous and semi-autonomous systems. Then, we systematically review the existing autonomous robotic systems developed for extracorporeal US acquisitions based on the hardware components, workflow and applications. Besides, we summarize three important topics related with the autonomous US acquisitions, including the scanning path planning, contact force control and image quality optimization, and introduce current methods and techniques proposed on each topic. Finally, we discuss the challenges and provide some potential directions for future research. We believe that the presented efforts in autonomous robotic US acquisitions will pave the way for a promising future of medical care and benefit a broad spectrum of clinical procedures.