Description:
A METHOD FOR GENERATING
POROELASTOGRAMS IN VIVO
Background: Ultrasound elastograms in are generated
by cross-correlating the sequentially-acquired post compression ultrasound data
with the reference pre-compression ultrasound data, thus generating an image
that allows for differentiation of tissues types, i.e. benign vs. malignant
tumors. A new ultrasound elastographic technique, poroelastography, has been
recently introduced to describe the spatial and temporal behavior of poroelastic
materials. These materials are
characterized by porosity, permeability as well as the combined properties of
both a solid matrix and a fluid.
Current
Problems: Traditional elastograms are generated
based on the principal that the tissue being probed is purely an elastic,
single-phase (i.e., solid), isotropic and incompressible material. In-vivo, however, several tissues,
including poroelastic tissues such as brain, cartilage and cancer tumors,
exhibit responses that are not adequately described by such a linear elastic
model. This elastic model has been proven to be not adequate for imaging these
poroelastic tissues in vivo because of the noise problems that are
encountered due to uncontrolled tissue motion, which may be significant with
compression
The
Technology: Dr. Jonathan Ophir and his team at The
University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston have developed a new method
for generating poroelastograms in
vivo. The method minimizes the
noise between the pre- and post-compression data sets since the reference
pre-compression data frame is continuously moved in time, while the inter-frame
time interval is maintained sufficiently short during the entire acquisition.
This allows the generation of good quality poroelastograms in vivo for short
(sub-second) as well as long (multi-second) acquisition times. The acquired data
are then used to create images that depict the time-dependent changes that occur
in the material due to fluid flow.
Selected
Publications: Righetti, R., Ophir, J.,
Chandrasekhar, RM., Garra, BS. And Krouskop, TA: “A new method for generating
poroelastograms in noisy environments.” Ultrasonic Imaging, 27, pp. 181-198,
September 2005.
UTHealth Ref.
No(s): 2006-0008
Inventor(s): Dr. Jonathan Ophir and Dr. Raffaella
Righetti
Patent
Status: 4 issued US patents (7,779,692;
7,905,148; 7,954,379; and 7,905,147)