Grey-scale ultrasound imaging (Octoson)
Ecografía en escala de grises (Octoson)
- Date
- 1970-1976 · confidence medium
- Place
- Commonwealth Acoustic Laboratories, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
- Credited to
- George Kossoff and David Robinson
- Field
- Life & health
⚠️ Disputed: the sources disagree.
What it is
An ultrasound scanner with eight transducers in a water tank that showed tissues in different shades of grey, not just as dots or lines. It made ultrasound useful for diagnosis in obstetrics and the abdomen.
The Octoson was commercialised around 1976; the grey-scale development is credited to Kossoff and his group, though Ian Donald (Glasgow) and other groups in the US and UK worked in parallel.
What it led to
- large-scale obstetric ultrasound
- general-purpose ultrasound scanners in hospitals
- medical imaging without ionising radiation