The industry’s first 16-channel ultrasound AFEs

The AFEs integrate a range of features to maximise image quality and performance while minimising power consumption and system cost. To optimise system efficiency, these families offer multiple versions with and without a demodulation block and JESD204B interface option, which further simplifies board layout and provides cost savings. The families also offer industry-leading low power consumption for the noise performance achieved, enabling portable solutions that offer better imaging performance without negatively impacting the power budget.

Key features and benefits:

• Highest integration: The AFE5818 and AFE5816 families are the industry’s first 16-channel simultaneously sampling AFEs, enabling system-level optimisation.
• Minimal power consumption: The AFE5818 and AFE5816 offer power consumption as low as 94 and 52mW per channel, respectively - 33% better per channel than the competition.
• JESD204B interface: The AFE58JD18 and AFE58JD16 include a 5Gb/s JESD204B serial interface,reducing ultrasound system data I/O routing by as much as 80% compared to other data interface standards and enabling a data rate of up to 6.4Gb/s. This standard interface creates a seamless connection to high-performance processors such as TI’s 66AK2L06 multicore processor.
• Digital Time Gain Compensation (DTGC): The AFE58JD16 and AFE5816 include a DTGC engine with 0.125dB resolution, which reduces noise and power consumption. DTGC also reduces the need for external components, compared to traditional analogue time gain compensation.
• Digital demodulator: The AFE58JD18 and AFE58JD16 also feature an on-chip digital demodulator, which conditions 16-channels of data from RF to a baseband frequency. This reduces the load on the system processing engine to enable lower latency and higher image quality.

Complementing the AFE5818 and AFE5816 families is TI’s ADS52J90, a new 16-channel high-speed ADC that can be configured for up to 32 inputs, for ultrasound receiver designs that require greater front end design flexibility. The ADC also offers the on-chip digital demodulator for reducing processor or FPGA costs, as well as a LVDS or JESD204B serial interface for faster data rates.

TI offers EVMs for the AFE5818, AFE5816 and ADS52J90 families for quick and easy evaluation. The AFE5818EVM, AFE58JD18EVM and AFE58JD16EVM are priced at $599, and the ADS52J90EVM is priced at $1,249. All EVMs are available from the TI store and authorised distributors.

The AFE5818 and AFE5816 families and ADS52J90 are all available today. Pricing in 1,000 unit quantities starts from $130 each.