CAREER: Understanding the Fundamental Dynamics of Angular Momentum Carrying Acoustic Wave Propagation

这项学院早期职业发展(Career)赠款将使人们能够发展与各向异性生物材料中携带声波的角动量传播有关的新知识，这对它们在生物医学成像、治疗和治疗中的应用至关重要。携带角动量的声波，如声涡流束，是一种具有旋转压力场或能量流的特殊类型的声波。以前的研究表明，这些波可能有许多潜在的生物医学应用，包括比传统超声成像分辨率更高的医学成像，以及比经典聚焦超声疗法更有效的靶向超声治疗肾结石和血栓。然而，这些研究主要集中在波在水下的传播，而忽略了肌肉纤维等生物材料的各向异性和非均质性。最近的理论研究表明，声波角动量在各向异性或非均质材料中传播时会发生耦合，改变波的传播路径，并可能阻碍它们在建议的生物医学应用中的可靠使用。这项由该职业奖支持的研究旨在通过建模和实验来了解不同声角动量之间的基本耦合机制，特别是在各向异性生物材料中传播时。这一理解将被应用于演示通过各向异性介质的成像和血栓溶解能力。这项研究的结果将促进声学、动力学、生物力学以及生物医学工程方面的知识，并可能导致新的医疗诊断和治疗方法。该奖项将通过与佐治亚理工学院现有的项目合作，对STEM教育产生积极影响，这些项目旨在吸引来自亚特兰大公立学校和亚特兰大国际学校的学生和高中科学教师，特别是来自目前代表性不足的群体的学生和教师，并促进他们参与研究。该奖项将利用佐治亚理工学院创业挑战赛来激励本科生，并鼓励他们利用从这项研究中学到的知识，在这场跨学科创新比赛中竞争。这项研究的目的是建立和实验验证新的模型，准确地预测角动量携带声波在各向异性介质中的传播。本征和外在声波在各向异性材料中传播时发生耦合，从而改变了波的传播轨迹。这项研究的中心假设是，这种耦合是通过波-介质相互作用引起的旋转引起的科里奥利效应发生的。研究人员将在理论模型以及在水下和软各向异性介质中进行的实验中检验这一假设。他们将探索将这种理解转化为建议的成像和溶栓能力的能力，使用各向异性组织模拟凝胶进行实验。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) grant will enable the development of new knowledge related to the propagation of angular momentum carrying acoustic waves in anisotropic biomaterials, which is critical for their use in biomedical imaging, therapies, and treatment. Angular momentum carrying acoustic waves, such as acoustic vortex beam, are a special type of sound waves that have a rotating pressure field or energy flux. Previous studies indicated that these waves could have many potential biomedical applications, including medical imaging with better resolution than traditional ultrasound imaging and targeted ultrasonic removal of kidney stones and blood clots with higher efficacy than classical focused ultrasound therapies. However, these studies focused on waves propagating underwater and ignored the anisotropy and heterogeneity of biomaterials such as muscle fibers. Recent theoretical studies have indicated that acoustic angular momenta will couple when propagating in anisotropic or heterogeneity materials, altering the propagation path of the wave, and potentially impeding their reliable use in the suggested biomedical applications. The research supported by this CAREER award seeks to understand the fundamental coupling mechanism between different acoustic angular momenta, especially when propagating in anisotropic biomaterials, through modeling and experimentation. This understanding will be applied to demonstrate imaging and blood clot thrombolysis capabilities through anisotropic media. The results from this research will advance knowledge in acoustics, dynamics, biomechanics, as well as biomedical engineering, and can potentially lead to novel medical diagnostics and therapies. This award will positively impact STEM education through collaboration with existing programs at Georgia Tech aimed to engage students and high school science teachers from the Atlanta Public Schools and Atlanta International School, especially from currently underrepresented groups, and to promote their participation in research. This award will leverage the Georgia Tech InVenture Challenge to motivate undergraduate students and encourage them to compete in this interdisciplinary innovation competition using knowledge learned from this research. The objective of this research is to create and experimentally validate new models that accurately predict the propagation of angular momentum carrying acoustic waves in anisotropic media. Intrinstic and extrinsic acoustic waves become coupled when propagating in anisotropic materials, thus shifting the wave propagation trajectory. The central hypothesis of this research is that this coupling occurs through Coriolis effects resulting from rotations induced by the wave-medium interactions. The researchers will test this hypothesis in theoretical models and in experiments conducted underwater and in soft anisotropic media. They will probe the ability to translate this understanding to the suggested imaging and thrombolysis capabilities experimentally using anisotropic tissue mimicking gels.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.