Plural un-countable nouns

Question

Hi,Can you help me with one sentence:Ultrasounds intensify mass exchange during vacuum impregnation, thus affect overall yield of the process.Should it be ultrasounds or ultrasound? I'm used to using ultrasounds as a noun and ultrasound as an adjective.Should it be 'intensify' and 'affect' or 'intensifies' and 'affects'? I'm explaining it  'ultrasounds (it) intensifies ... and affects ...' Am I right?Can you explain me these doubts?Thank you.

GPY · Accepted Answer

Ultrasound intensifies mass exchange during vacuum impregnation, thus affecting the overall yield of the process.

Ultrasound intensifies mass exchange during vacuum impregnation and thus affects the overall yield of the process.

Ultrasound intensifies mass exchange during vacuum impregnation, and thus it affects the overall yield of the process.

I can't be sure whether "intensifies mass exchange" is the correct way to say this. Consider whether you mean "improving/improves" rather than "affecting/affects".

"ultrasound" is almost always uncountable (except in a special sense as an abbreviation of "ultrasound scan"). The instances of "ultrasounds" that I found in a quick look through Google Book Search results were either in the sense of "ultrasound scans" or were written by authors with non-English names, possibly non-native speakers.

You refer to the use of "ultrasound" as an adjective, presumably having in mind cases such as "ultrasound scan". In fact, "ultrasound" is not a true adjective in such cases, but an attributive noun (noun used to modify another).

Plural un-countable nouns

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