The color priority determines which signal of B-mode and Doppler, detected from the same location will be displayed in a given pixel. Low color priorities will allow solid tissue to conceal Doppler shifts at the same location; a high priority ensures that color will overwrite the gray scale image.
Also called color-echo write priority or angio write priority.

See also Directional Indicators.

Color saturation is a characteristic used for example to describe the vividness of a color, or the gradation of hue from unsaturated (white) to fully saturated (100% of the given color).

See also Directional Indicators, and Power Map.

Composite arrays are combinations of piezoelectric ceramics and polymers that form a new material with different properties. Piezocomposites improve the performance of usual arrays such as the mechanically scanned annular array and the linear phased array.
Piezocomposites reduce the acoustic impedance with a better impedance match with tissue. The result is a reduction of the reverberation level in the near field. Unwanted surface waves propagating laterally over the transducer are suppressed. The composite materials allow to vary the electromechanical coupling constant, and to give better control over the trade-off between sensitivity and bandwidth.

See also Narrow Bandwidth, Dead Zone, Ultrasound Phantom.

Compound B-mode imaging takes different forms and refers to different methods of creating the ultrasound image.
Real-time compound ultrasound improves the image quality of B-mode scanning by combining ultrasound information obtained from multiple angles. The used averaging process of compound B-mode reduces artifacts and improves the representation of true image data.
B-mode images and Doppler mode images (see also Duplex) can be compounded on the display to improve the visualization of the anatomical relationships between vessels and the surrounding tissues.

Compress is a signal processing control on some ultrasound systems that affects the gray scale and overall gain.