SCH: INT: Photoacoustic-Guided Cardiac Interventions

心脏病仍然是世界范围内的头号死亡原因。介入性心脏病治疗的有效性需要使用X射线，这可能对患者以及随着时间的推移经历重复暴露的操作员有害。此外，心脏附近的主要神经（膈神经）的意外损伤可能导致手术后呼吸困难。这两个巨大的挑战将通过光和声的结合来解决，称为光声成像，这是一种有前途的新方法，可以（1）在机器人辅助下将治疗导管引导到心脏，（2）可视化神经。首先，该项目将推进机器人光声成像技术，引入一个全新的概念，减少目前对X射线的依赖。其次，该项目将扩展我们对光声成像的关键神经特性的知识，以在微创和开胸心脏手术期间启动神经可视化的范式转变，这两者都需要在膈神经周围仔细导航。该奖项还将成为一种工具，以增加少数民族参与计算机科学和工程，指导下一代技术领导者，开发与研究成果相关的新课程材料，并使研究成果与工程和临床社区的跨学科共享。该奖项的目的是综合声学模型和实验光学分析，以了解创新机器人光声成像系统在指导心脏手术和干预方面的局限性。该项目有三个基本研究目标。首先，新的声学模型将被引入，开发和完善，以预测在基于光声的机器人控制过程中光声信号可视化和分割的可能性，这将被用来倡导一种减少对X射线依赖的新范式。 该预测将基本的光声空间相干理论与光声信噪比和相关的激光能量联系起来，以避免目前为确定新技术所需的最低能量而实施的耗时的试错程序。然后将这种基于理论的方法与深度学习方法进行比较，这些方法具有超过理论极限的潜力。其次，目前不存在的多个膈神经的光学特性的特点，以创造现实的期望，在心脏手术的神经可视化和回避的挑战性任务。第三，理论声学模型、深度学习方法、基于视觉的机器人控制和神经表征结果的集成将被评估为一个新型的互联系统，以指导体内心脏手术。这项研究有希望减少电离辐射暴露，提高神经光学特性的现有知识，并消除神经相关损伤并发症，同时为工程，计算机视觉，生物医学光学，该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并被认为是值得通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的评估支持。影响审查标准。

Heart disease remains the number one cause of death worldwide. The effectiveness of interventional heart disease treatment requires the use of x-rays, which can be harmful to patients as well as operators who experience repeated exposure over time. In addition, accidental injury to a major nerve near the heart (the phrenic nerve) can cause breathing difficulties after surgery. These two grand challenges will be tackled with the combination of light and sound, known as photoacoustic imaging, which is a promising new method to (1) guide treatment catheters to the heart with robotic assistance and (2) visualize nerves. First, this project will advance robotic photoacoustic imaging technology to introduce a radically new concept that will reduce current reliance on x-rays. Second, this project will expand our knowledge of critical nerve properties for photoacoustic imaging to initiate a paradigm shift for nerve visualization during minimally invasive and open chest heart procedures, which both require careful navigation around the phrenic nerve. This award will also be a vehicle to increase minority participation in computer science and engineering, to mentor the next generation of technological leaders, to develop new course material related to research findings, and to enable cross-disciplinary sharing of research results with engineering and clinical communities. The objective of this award is to synthesize acoustic models and experimental optical analyses to understand the limits of an innovative robotic photoacoustic imaging system for guiding cardiac surgeries and interventions. The project has three fundamental research aims. First, new acoustic models will be introduced, developed, and refined to predict the likelihood of photoacoustic signal visualization and segmentation during photoacoustic-based robot control, which will be used to advocate a novel paradigm of reduced reliance on x-rays. This prediction will relate fundamental photoacoustic spatial coherence theory to photoacoustic signal-to-noise ratios and associated laser energies in order to avoid the time-consuming, trial-and-error procedures that are currently implemented to determine minimum required energies for the new technology. This theory-based approach will then be compared with deep learning approaches that exhibit the potential to exceed theoretical limits. Second, the currently nonexistent optical properties of multiple phrenic nerves will be characterized in order to create realistic expectations for the challenging task of nerve visualization and avoidance during cardiac procedures. Third, the integration of theoretical acoustic models, deep learning methods, vision-based robot control, and nerve characterization results will be evaluated as a novel interconnected system to guide in vivo cardiac procedures. This research has promising potential to reduce ionizing radiation exposure, to improve current knowledge of nerve optical properties, and to eliminate nerve-related injury complications, while making fundamental contributions to the disciplines of engineering, computer vision, biomedical optics, and medicine.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.