Ultrasound Guidance and Monitoring of High-power Ultrasound Therapies

高强度聚焦超声(IFUS)包括高强度聚焦超声(HIFU)和组织摩擦学，是一种高功率超声治疗方式，具有广泛的临床应用前景。磁共振成像(MRI)目前被认为是监测和控制HIFU治疗的金标准成像方法。然而，时间分辨率低、成本高、对MRI兼容部件的使用要求以及MRI支架的受限空间内的安装要求等一系列具有挑战性的问题限制了MRI作为临床HIFU治疗监测和控制的选择方法。超声成像是一种相对便宜、非电离和实时的成像方式，可以与IFUS换能器无缝集成。这些特性使超声成像成为IFUS治疗监测和控制的一种潜在合适的成像方式。目前的建议旨在建立在PI在超声图像引导的IFUS治疗领域的建模/模拟和实验/开发方面的研究活动的基础上。拟议的研究计划旨在：(A)扩展由PI及其研究小组正在开发的现有非线性超声建模和仿真算法，以包括准确有效的3D非线性组织温度估计和HIFU损伤发生动力学预测，以及(B)扩展由PI及其研究小组正在开发的基于超声的现有方法，以开发用于实时、准确和稳健地监测和控制组织中的HIFU治疗的新方法。这项拟议研究的成功完成将使超声成像在监测和控制HIFU治疗方面与磁共振成像处于竞争地位，这反过来将导致HIFU在广泛的临床应用中作为一种非侵入性或微创治疗方式得到更广泛的接受。

Intensive focused ultrasound (IFUS), that encompasses high intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) and histotripsy, is a high-power ultrasound therapy modality with a number of promising established and novel clinical applications. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is currently considered as a gold standard imaging method for monitoring and control of HIFU therapy. However, a number of challenging problems including low temporal resolution, high cost, requirement for the use of MRI-compatible parts, and fitting requirement within the confined space of the MRI gantry, prohibited MRI to be adopted as a method of choice for clinical HIFU therapy monitoring and control. Ultrasound imaging is a relatively inexpensive, non-ionizing and real-time imaging modality that could seamlessly be integrated with an IFUS transducer. These attributes make ultrasound imaging a potentially suitable imaging modality for IFUS treatment monitoring and control. The current proposal aims to build upon PI’s research activities in the area of ultrasound image-guided IFUS therapy in both modeling/simulation, and experiment/development aspects. The proposed research program is aimed towards: (a) expansion of current nonlinear ultrasound modeling and simulation algorithms, being developed by the PI and his research group, to include accurate and effective 3D nonlinear tissue temperature estimation and HIFU lesion generation dynamics prediction, and (b) expansion of current ultrasound-based methods, being developed by the PI and his research group, to develop new methods for real-time accurate and robust monitoring and control of HIFU therapies in tissue. Successful completion of the proposed research will bring ultrasound imaging into a competing position with the MRI for monitoring and control of HIFU therapies, which will, in turn, lead to a wider acceptance of HIFU as a non- or minimally-invasive therapy modality in a wide range of clinical applications.