Acoustic Angiography Using Dual-Frequency and Ultrawideband CMUT Arrays

使用双频和超宽带 CMUT 阵列的声学血管造影

• 批准号: 9899252
• 负责人: Paul A Dayton
• 金额: $ 45.18万
• 依托单位: NORTH CAROLINA STATE UNIVERSITY RALEIGH
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2018
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2018-07-01 至 2022-03-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/9899252
• 关键词: 3-Dimensional; Acoustics; Angiography; Artificial Implants; Behavior; Blood Vessel Tissue; Blood Vessels; Breast; Chest wall structure; Clinical; Collaborations; Contrast Media; Data; Detection; Development; Devices; Dimensions; Disease; Elements; Fingerprint; Fostering; Frequencies; Image; Imaging Techniques; In Vitro; Lesion; Malignant - descriptor; Malignant Neoplasms; Mammary Ultrasonography; Mammography; Measurement; Mechanics; Methods; Microbubbles; Morphologic artifacts; Noise; Pattern; Pensions; Performance; Physiologic pulse; Population; Problem Solving; Process; Production; Property; Prostate; Public Health; Research; Research Personnel; Resolution; Scanning; Sensitivity and Specificity; Signal Transduction; Specificity; Structure; System; Techniques; Technology; Testing; Thyroid Gland; Tissues; Transducers; Ultrasonic Transducer; Ultrasonography; Validation; Visualization; Woman; Work; angiogenesis; animal imaging; base; breast lesion; breast malignancies; cancer biomarkers; cancer imaging; clinical translation; contrast enhanced; contrast imaging; cost; design; electric impedance; experience; high resolution imaging; imaging approach; improved; in vivo; millimeter; novel; operation; pre-clinical; preclinical study; pressure; prototype; standard of care; technology validation; tool; transmission process; tumor; young woman

ABSTRACT Over the past few years, progress in the development of ultrawideband transmit-receive systems for ultrasound imaging has enabled new imaging paradigms. One such application, which our group has developed is ‘acoustic angiography’, a superharmonic imaging technique which is based on the fact that when excited with a moderate acoustic pressure near their resonance (2-4 MHz; around MI of 0.5-0.7) ultrasound contrast agents produce broadband content which extends well past 15 MHz. The result is that signals from ultrasound contrast agents can be separated from those from tissue with high efficacy, and the resulting images benefit from the high resolution received data. This new imaging technique has enabled the acquisition of images of microvascular structure with unprecedented resolution and signal-to-noise ratio, and created a paradigm shift in how ultrasound might be used pre-clinically and clinically in assessing tumor associated angiogenesis. For clinical translation, we are targeting to improve the specificity of ultrasound to breast malignancies, and furthermore to improve sensitivity to very small lesions using acoustic angiography. In prior studies, our work has shown the use of acoustic angiography to detect micro-tumors with very high sensitivity and specificity based on their microvascular angiogenic signature, rather than relying on difference in tissue properties of the tumor mass itself. Although the presence of this high-frequency energy from microbubbles has been known about for over a decade, it has not been taken advantage of until our recent work because it requires transducers with an extraordinarily wide bandwidth not currently available. Although our prior studies have shown great promise using multi-element multi-frequency piezoelectric transducers, a more natural match for this moderate-pressure high-bandwidth application is the capacitive micromachined ultrasonic transducer (CMUT). The use of CMUTs provides benefits over piezoelectrics such as the ability to perform with a very wide bandwidth as well as the possibility of multi-frequency configurations through their micromachined production process. In our preliminary studies, we have experimentally shown the feasibility of dual-frequency CMUTs for transmitting low frequency excitation and receive high frequency harmonics. We have also demonstrated novel techniques for eliminating the natural harmonic content produced by CMUT transducers, a limitation which was previously thought to hamper the performance of these devices for nonlinear microbubble imaging. In this project, a team of investigators with extensive experience in contrast ultrasound imaging and acoustic angiography (Dayton) and CMUT transducer design and fabrication (Oralkan) continue to work together to achieve new performance levels in CMUT transducers for contrast-enhanced ultrasound imaging, with the intent of developing a new cancer imaging approach using CMUT arrays and microbubble contrast agents.

摘要 在过去的几年里，超声超宽带发射-接收系统的开发进展 成像使新的成像范例成为可能。我们团队开发的一个这样的应用程序是 “声学血管造影术”，这是一种超谐成像技术，它基于这样一个事实，即当受到 其共振附近的中等声压(2-4 MHz；MI约为0.5-0.7)超声造影剂 产生远远超过15 MHz的宽带内容。结果是来自超声波信号 可以将造影剂与组织中的造影剂高效分离，所产生的图像受益 从高分辨率接收到的数据。这项新的成像技术使获取 具有前所未有的分辨率和信噪比的微血管结构，并创造了一种范式转变 超声如何在临床前和临床上用于评估肿瘤相关血管生成。为 临床翻译，我们的目标是提高超声对乳腺恶性肿瘤的特异性，以及 此外，使用声学血管造影术可以提高对微小病变的敏感度。在之前的研究中，我们的工作 已经证明使用声学血管造影术来检测微小肿瘤具有非常高的敏感性和特异性 基于它们的微血管新生血管特征，而不是依赖于 肿瘤本身。虽然已经知道这种来自微泡的高频能量的存在 大约十多年来，它一直没有被我们最近的工作所利用，因为它需要 具有极宽带宽的换能器目前不可用。尽管我们之前的研究已经 使用多元素多频压电换能器显示出巨大的前景，更自然地匹配 这种中压高带宽的应用是电容式微机械超声换能器。 (CMUT)。CMUT的使用提供了比压电性材料更好的优点，例如能够在非常 宽带宽以及通过微机械加工实现多频率配置的可能性 生产工艺。在我们的初步研究中，我们已经通过实验证明了双频的可行性。 用于传输低频激励和接收高频谐波的CMUT。我们还有 展示了消除CMUT换能器产生的自然谐波含量的新技术， 以前被认为阻碍了这些非线性微泡装置的性能的限制 成像。在这个项目中，一个在声学造影和超声成像方面拥有丰富经验的研究团队 声学血管造影术(代顿)和CMUT换能器设计和制造(Oralkan)继续工作 共同实现用于对比增强超声成像的CMUT换能器的新性能水平， 意在开发一种使用CMUT阵列和微泡造影剂的新的癌症成像方法 探员们。