Patent Application
20190166716
This application claims priority to Chinese Patent Application No. 201711226414.6 filed on Nov. 29, 2017, the entire content of which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety for all purposes.
The present disclosure relates to a heat dissipating device for a medical apparatus.
With the development of medical imaging apparatuses such as a Computed Tomography (CT) scanner, a number of slices of a detector system in the CT scanner is increasing, and, consequently, a number of pixel units of the detector are also increasing, causing the entire CT scanner to generate a larger amount of heat. For other medical imaging apparatuses, similar problems may also exist if there are also detector components rotating during operation.
NEUSOFT MEDICAL SYSTEMS CO., LTD. (NMS), founded in 1998 with its world headquarters in China, is a leading supplier of medical device, medical IT solutions, and healthcare services. NMS supplies medical device with a wide portfolio, including CT, Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), digital X-ray machine, ultrasound, Positron Emission Tomography (PET), Linear Accelerator (LINAC), and biochemistry analyser. Currently, NMS' products are exported to over 60 countries and regions around the globe, serving more than 5,000 renowned customers. NMS's latest successful developments, such as 128 Multi-Slice CT Scanner System, Superconducting MRI, LINAC, and PET products, have led China to become a global high-end medical device producer. As an integrated supplier with extensive experience in large medical device, NMS has been committed to the study of avoiding secondary potential harm caused by excessive X-ray irradiation to the subject during the CT scanning process.
A one-to-one corresponding relationship between component names and reference numerals in
a CT scanner rotating system 1, a detector 2, an air supply unit 3, an air director 4, an outer wall 41 of the air director 4, an air inlet 411, an air outlet 42, a mounting base 43, a housing 5, an inlet 51, an air distributing hole 521, an air chamber 53, an inner wall 52 of the air chamber 53, and a rotating axis S.
After a temperature of an entire CT scanner increases, on one hand, thermal expansion and deformation of internal mechanical structure of the CT scanner may affect detection accuracy and on the other hand electronic noise of a detector system may increase, thereby reducing a signal-to-noise ratio of collected signals and affecting the image quality of the CT scanner. Therefore, the detector of the CT scanner is to be maintained at a relatively stable and lower temperature by heat dissipation for the detector of the CT scanner.
Heat dissipation may be performed for the detector by taking in air from a front chamber of a host of the CT scanner or a water-cooling system may be provided in a housing chamber of a main gantry to indirectly maintain a stable temperature of the detector system. But the heat dissipation effect of both of the above two manners is not good.
Without loss of generality, a heat dissipating device of a detector of a CT scanner is taken as an example for illustration herein. It may be understood that a heat dissipating device of a similar structure may also be used for detectors of other medical apparatuses, and may be changed adaptively according to the structure of a specific device, which will not be described one by one.
The CT scanner rotating system 1 may drive the detector 2 to rotate around the rotating axis S to complete a CT scan. The CT scanner rotating system 1 in
The heat dissipating device may further include an air source and an air chamber structure formed in the housing 5 of the CT scanner. The housing 5 includes an inlet 51 in communication with the air source, an air chamber 53 in communication with the inlet 51, and an outlet in communication with the air chamber 53. The outlet is in communication with the air outlet 42 of the air director 4. Obviously, the outlet communicates with the air outlet 42 through the air inlet 411 of the air director 4.
It is to be noted that for a CT scanner, the above air chamber structure is usually in a front housing of the housing 5. In an example, at least a portion of the front housing is a double-layered structure to form the air chamber 53. In another example, the entire front housing is a double-layered structure to form the air chamber 53. In addition, for different devices, the air chamber structure may be provided at different positions of the housing 5 and is not limited to the front housing, so as to facilitate the formation of an air duct structure for heat dissipation.
According to the heat dissipating device of the CT scanner provided by this example, the air director 4 is fixedly provided on the detector 2 of the CT scanner, and the air chamber 53 in communication with the air source is provided in the housing 5. The air director 4 has an air outlet 42 in communication with the air supply unit 3 mounted on the detector 2 and an air inlet 411 in communication with the air outlet 42. The outlet of the air chamber 53 is in communication with the air inlet 411 of the air director 4. In this way, air from an external air source may be directly led to the air supply unit 3 of the detector 2 through the air chamber 53 of the housing 5 and the air director 4. Since heat dissipating air is directly supplied from the external air source to the rotating detector 2, it may be effectively ensured that temperature-stable air is supplied to the detector 2 so as to form an air current with a relatively uniform temperature. Thus, the detector 2 may be maintained at a relatively stable operating temperature.
The air supply unit 3 mounted on the detector 2 may take many forms. For example, the air supply unit 3 may include one or more fans. An air supply opening of the air supply unit 3 may be formed by an air inlet opening of each of the fans. Of course, only one centralized air supply opening may be provided for the air supply unit 3.
In an example, as shown in
As shown in
The air director 4 may be fixed to the detector 2 in a plurality of manners. For example, as shown in
With reference to
With reference to
The outlet of the air chamber 53 may include one or more air distributing hole groups. Each of the air distributing hole groups may include a plurality of air distributing holes 521, and the plurality of air distributing holes 521 of each of the air distributing hole groups are arranged annularly. For example, the plurality of air distributing holes 521 of one air distributing hole group may be uniformly arranged in an annular-shape region concentric with the rotating axis S of the detector 2, where the centres of the plurality of air distributing holes 521 of each of the air distributing hole groups may be located on a circumference of a circle concentric with the rotating axis S of the detector 2.
The outer wall 41 of the air director 4 may be fitted with the inner wall 52 of the air chamber 53 formed in the housing 5 so that the air distributing holes 521 may be in direct communication with the air inlet 411. Obviously, after each of the components is assembled, the outer wall 41 of the air director 4 is substantially fitted with the inner wall 52 of the housing 5. In this way, the air distributing holes 521 formed in the inner wall 52 of the housing 5 may directly supply heat dissipating air transferred from the air source to the air inlet 411 of the air director 4.
Since the air director 4 is fixed on the detector 2 and the detector 2 rotates along with the CT scanner rotating system 1 during operation, the air director 4 may also rotate around the rotating axis S together with the detector 2. Thus, the air inlet 411 and each of the air distributing hole groups may be respectively arranged into a structure concentric with the rotating axis S as above, so that there will always be air distributing holes 521 communicating with the air inlet 411 of the air director 4 at any position to which the air director 4 rotates along with the detector 2. Thus, it may be ensured that the heat dissipating air is always transferred to the air director 4 during the operation of the detector 2, and is further transferred to the air supply unit 3 of the detector 2.
In the example shown in
It is to be noted that a number of the air distributing holes 521 of each of the air distributing hole groups may be set according to actual needs.
The outer wall 41 of the air director 4 may also be arranged into an arc-shaped structure concentric with the rotating axis S, which may facilitate the arrangement of the air inlet 411. The inner wall 52 of the air chamber 53 may be arranged into an annular plate-like structure concentric with the rotating axis S, which also facilitates the formation of the air distributing holes 521.
In the example shown in
The plurality of air distributing holes 521 of each of the air distributing hole groups may be provided in the following way: the closer the distributing holes 521 are to the inlet 51, the sparser the air distributing holes 521 are; and the further the distributing holes 521 are from the inlet 51, the denser the air distributing holes 521 are. In this way, when the air director 4 rotates along with the detector 2, the amount of air entering the air director 4 at any angle position may be equivalent. The reason is that the closer the air distributing holes 521 are to the inlet 51, the shorter a path along which the heat dissipating air runs through the inlet 51 and the air distributing holes 521 to the air inlet 411 of the air director 4 is, therefore, a relatively large amount of heat dissipating air flows into the air director 4. By arranging the air distributing holes 521 close to the inlet 51 relatively sparsely and arranging the air distributing holes 521 far from the inlet 51 relatively densely, the amount of the heat dissipating air received by the air director 4 when rotating to different positions may be relatively balanced.
The plurality of air distributing holes 521 of each of the air distributing hole groups may also be provided in the following way: the closer the air distributing holes 521 are to the inlet 51, the smaller the apertures of the air distributing holes 521 are; the further the air distributing holes 521 are from the inlet 51, the larger the apertures of the air distributing holes 521 are. In this way, when the air director 4 rotates along with the detector 2, the amount of air entering the air director 4 at any angle position may be equivalent.
The plurality of air distributing holes 521 of each of the air distributing hole groups may also be arranged by combining the above two manners: the closer the air distributing holes 521 are to the inlet 51, the sparser the air distributing holes 521 are, and the smaller the apertures of the air distributing holes 521 are; the further the air distributing holes 521 are from the inlet 51, the denser the air distributing holes 521 are, and the larger the apertures of the air distributing holes 521 are. In this way, a reasonable distribution may be achieved so that the amount of the heat dissipating air received by the air director 4 when rotating to any position is relatively equivalent. As shown in
In the example shown in
The outer wall 41 of the air director 4 may be fitted with the inner wall 52 of the housing 5, which may effectively reduce an amount of heat dissipating air that leaks from between the outer wall 41 of the air director 4 and the inner wall 52 of the housing 5 after entering the air chamber 53. However, during the rotation of the air director 4, the outer wall 41 of the air director 4 will rub against the inner wall 52 of the housing 53, which contributes to a particular degree of wear and tear to the outer wall 41 of the air director 41 and the inner wall 52 of the housing 5.
In an example, the outer wall 41 of the air director 4 may be in clearance fit with the inner wall 52 of the housing 5 so that the air director 4 does not come in contact with and rub against the inner wall 52 of the housing 5 when rotating. In this way, although there is leakage of heat dissipating air, wear and tear between the air director 4 and the inner wall 52 of the housing 5 may be effectively avoided, thereby prolonging the service life of the CT scanner effectively.
In fact, during the rotation of the air director 4, the heat dissipating air will also flow out from air distributing holes 521 that are not aligned with the air inlet 411 of the air director 4. A total amount of air supplied by the air source to the air chamber 53 is at least the sum of the amount of air required for the heat dissipation of the detector 2 and the amount of air leaked from the inner wall 52 of the housing 5. Here, the amount of air leaked from the inner wall 52 of the housing 5 may include the amount of air flowing out from the air distributing holes 521 that are not aligned with the air inlet 411 of the air director 4 and the amount of air leaked from the clearance between the outer wall 41 of the air director 4 and the inner wall 52 of the housing 5.
The outer wall 41 of the air director 4 may also be arranged into an annular structure concentric with the rotating axis S, and the air inlet 411 formed thereon may still take an arc shape. In this way, during the rotation of the air director 4, the air inlet 411 may be still in communication only with the air distributing holes 521 at a position corresponding to the air inlet 411, and a portion of the outer wall 41 of the air director 4 where air inlet 411 is not opened may block air distributing holes 521 that are not aligned and in communication with the air inlet 411 so as to effectively reduce the amount of leaked air and further reduce a requirement for the total amount of air of the air source.
The air source may be a fan provided in an air hood, and the inlet 51 of the housing 5 may be in direct communication with an air outlet of the air hood. In this way, for a CT scanner, the air director of the fan may be a front housing of a scanning gantry, and the inlet 51 of the housing 5 may be in direct communication with an air outlet of the front housing of the scanning gantry.
In addition, the air hood of the fan serving as the air source may also be provided separately. For example, the air hood may be provided outside the scanning gantry or outside the CT gantry. At this time, the inlet 51 of the housing 5 may be in communication with the air outlet of the air hood of the fan through an air supply duct. Further, an air conditioner may be provided in the air supply duct to perform processing, such as temperature stabilization, dehumidification, purification or pressure stabilization, on the air to enter the air chamber 53 of the housing 5.
Of course, it may be understood that the air source may also be an air supply machine such as a blower or a ventilator in addition to a fan.
The above are detailed descriptions of a heat dissipating device of a detector of a medical imaging apparatus provided in the present disclosure. Specific examples are utilized herein to set forth the principles and implementations of the present disclosure, and the descriptions of the above examples are merely meant to help understanding the method and the core idea of the present disclosure. It should be noted that a plurality of improvements and modifications may also be made to the present disclosure by those of ordinary skill in the art without departing from the principles of the present disclosure, and such improvements and modifications shall all fall into the scope of protection of the claims of the present disclosure.
| Number | Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 201711226414.6 | Nov 2017 | CN | national |
