FPGA-Based Voltage and Current Dual Drive System for High Frame Rate Electrical Impedance Tomography

Electrical impedance tomography (EIT) is used to image the electrical property distribution of a tissue under test. An EIT system comprises complex hardware and software modules, which are typically designed for a specific application. Upgrading these modules is a time-consuming process, and requires rigorous testing to ensure proper functioning of new modules with the existing ones. To this end, we developed a modular and reconfigurable data acquisition (DAQ) system using National Instruments´ (NI) hardware and software modules, which offer inherent compatibility over generations of hardware and software revisions. The system can be configured to use up to 32-channels. This EIT system can be used to interchangeably apply current or voltage signal, and measure the tissue response in a semi-parallel fashion. A novel signal averaging algorithm, and 512-point fast Fourier transform (FFT) computation block was implemented on the FPGA. FFT output bins were classified as signal or noise. Signal bins constitute a tissue´s response to a pure or mixed tone signal. Signal bins´ data can be used for traditional applications, as well as synchronous frequency-difference imaging. Noise bins were used to compute noise power on the FPGA. Noise power represents a metric of signal quality, and can be used to ensure proper tissue-electrode contact. Allocation of these computationally expensive tasks to the FPGA reduced the required bandwidth between PC, and the FPGA for high frame rate EIT. In 16-channel configuration, with a signal-averaging factor of 8, the DAQ frame rate at 100 kHz exceeded 110 frames s ^-1, and signal-to-noise ratio exceeded 90 dB across the spectrum. Reciprocity error was found to be for frequencies up to 1 MHz. Static imaging experiments were performed on a high-conductivity inclusion placed in a saline filled tank; the inclusion was clearly localized in the reconstructions obtained for both absolute current and voltage mode data.