Ultrasound-induced cavitation can be used in various biomedical therapies, including localized drug delivery, sonoporation, gene transfer, noninvasive sonothrombolysis, lithotripsy, and histotripsy. It can also enhance thermal ablation of tumors and facilitate trans-blood–brain-barrier treatments. Accurate monitoring of cavitation activity, includi...
A versatile biomedical ultrasound
system has been developed and tested. The system controls and monitors high‐intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) exposures designed to produce therapeutic tissue lesions primarily by thermal phenomena. The system is used with custom HIFU transducer arrays that contain central diagnostic transducer arrays. The diagn...
Three-dimensional (3D) ultrasonic imaging can enable post-facto plane of interest selection. It can be performed with devices such as wobbler probes, matrix probes, and sensor-based probes. Ultrasound systems that support 3D-imaging are expensive with added hardware complexity compared to 2D-imaging systems. An inertial measurement unit (IMU) can p...
An understanding of the acoustic cavitation threshold is essential for minimizing cavitation bio-effects in diagnostic ultrasound and for controlling cavitation-mediated tissue ablation in focused ultrasound procedures. The homogeneous cavitation threshold is an intrinsic material property of recognized importance to biomedical ultrasound as well a...
The use of ultrasound in biomedical applications has evolved dramatically in the last few decades. Biomedical ultrasound first gained widespread use clinically as an imaging modality for monitoring pregnancy and diagnosing cardiovascular diseases. The introduction of encapsulated microbubbles as contrast agents enabled the development of contrast-e...
I was introduced to the Acoustical Society of America by Allan Pierce, who supervised my doctoral dissertation “Physical Theory of Narrow-Band Sounds Associated with Intracranial Aneurysms” in Penn State's Graduate Program in Acoustics. Professor Pierce also introduced me to Robert Waag, whose Diagnostic Ultrasound Research Laboratory I joined as a...
Interest in coated microbubbles as agents for therapeutic and quantitative imaging applications in biomedical ultrasound has increased the need for their accurate theoretical characterization. Effects such as gas diffusion, variation in the properties of the coating and the resulting changes in bubble behavior under repeated exposure to ultrasound...
Ultrasound contrast agents (UCAs) provide excellent potential applications for biomedical ultrasound imaging, as well as for transport and delivery of various therapeutic substances. Perception of encapsulated microbubble dynamics is essential for extending its biomedical applications in order to develop new drug or gene delivery techniques and als...
Biomedical ultrasound may induce adverse effects in patients by either thermal or non-thermal means. Temperatures above normal can adversely affect biological systems, but effects also may be produced without significant heating. Thermally induced teratogenesis has been demonstrated in many animal species as well as in a few controlled studies in h...
Since the development of biomedical ultrasound imaging from sonar after WWII, there has been a clear divide between ultrasonic imaging and ultrasound therapy. While imaging techniques are designed to cause as little change as possible in the tissues through which ultrasound propagates, ultrasound therapy typically relies upon heating or acoustic ca...
Since World War II, ultrasonic imaging has evolved from its sonar origins to include techniques borrowed from MRI, image processing, and computer modeling. Although diagnostic ultrasound techniques make increasing use of second-order physics such as tissue nonlinearity, much potentially useful information remains unexploited. In addition, safety an...
Biomedical ultrasound has seen remarkable advances in recent years. By utilizing the properties of nonlinear acoustics, diagnostic ultrasound has shown increased applicability to a wide number of clinical conditions and pathologies. Techniques such as harmonic imaging and the use of ultrasound contrast agents (stabilized microbubbles) have enabled...
