The applications of ultrasonic imaging and signal processing in two-phase flow measurement

The applications of ultrasonic imaging and signal processing in two-phase flow measurement have been investigated in this thesis. The scattering by single and many scatterers was studied experimentally and numerically. The statistical properties of the scattered waves from many scatterers were examined and the corresponding results are presented. Ultrasonic transmission/reflection mode tomography was introduced. The theories of reflection mode computerised tomography were developed, by which reflectivity functions and scattering amplitude functions can be reconstructed. Image restoration and interpretation methods are presented. Computer simulation of ultrasonic measurements were carried out. A ultrasonic tomographic imaging system was developed, in which fan-shaped sound beam insonification was employed. Static physical models were used to simulate two-phase flows. In order to speed up the data acquisition of a tomographic imaging system, the single receiver mode and multiple receiver mode data acquisition arrangements were studied by experiments. Experiments on imaging small and large objects were carried out. Several signal and image processing methods were examined. A modified histogram equalisation algorithm was developed for processing the resultant ultrasonic images. The experiment results show that the proposed image reconstruction methods are satisfactory. Possible future developments are proposed.