三层膜管壁结构的颈动脉超生仿真

颈动脉超声仿真 有助于血管壁超声检测及信号处理方法的性能评价。提出三层膜管壁结构的颈动脉超声仿真方法。根据组织散射点分布的形状和密度与超声回声斑点分布的变化规律,对临床图像统计分析,确定对应组织散射点分布、密度及强度等特征参数,利用FIELD II产生超声射频回波信号并得到B超图像。30 例仿真试验结果表明,血管壁内、中、外膜及血流回声的统计分布与临床B超图像的一致;与中心频率为8 MHz的结果相比,12 MHz仿真的内、中、外膜厚度及管腔直径测量均值与预设值相等,最大相对误差分别为4.01%, 1.25%, 0.04%及0.15%,仿真效果更为逼真。      

Asymmetric radial expansion and contraction of rat carotid artery observed using a high-resolution ultrasound imaging system

The geometry of carotid artery bifurcation is of high clinical interest because it determines the characteristics of blood flow that is closely related to the formation and development of atherosclerotic plaque. However, information on the dynamic changes in the vessel wall of carotid artery bifurcation during a pulsatile cycle is limited. This pilot study investigated the cyclic changes in carotid artery geometry caused by blood flow pulsation in rats. A high-resolution ultrasound imaging system with a broadband scanhead centered at 40 MHz was used to obtain longitudinal images of the rat carotid artery. A high frame rate retrospective B-scan imaging technique based on the use of electrocardiogram to trigger signal acquisition was used to examine precisely the fast arterial wall motion. Two-dimensional geometry data obtained from nine rats showed that the rat carotid artery asymmetrically contracts and dilates during each cardiac cycle. Systolic/diastolic vessel diameters near the upstream and downstream regions from the bifurcation were 0.976 ± 0.011/0.825 ± 0.015 mm and 0.766 ± 0.015/0.650 ± 0.016 mm, respectively. Their posterior/anterior wall displacement ratios in the radial direction were 41.0 ± 14.9% and 2.9 ± 1.6%, respectively. These results indicate that in the vicinity of bifurcation, the carotid artery favorably expands to the anterior side during the systolic phase. This phenomenon was observed to be more prominent in the downstream region near the bifurcation. The cyclic variation pattern in wall movement varies depending on the measurement site, which shows different patterns at far upstream and downstream of the bifurcation. The asymmetric radial expansion and contraction of the rat carotid artery observed in this study may be useful in studying the hemodynamic etiology of cardiovascular diseases because the pulsatile changes in vessel geometry may affect the local hemodynamics that determines the spatial distribution of wall shear stress, one of important cardiovascular risk factors. Further systematic study is needed to clarify the effects of wall elasticity, branch angle and vessel diameter ratio on the asymmetric wall motion of carotid artery bifurcation.     

3D reconstruction of a carotid bifurcation from 2D transversal ultrasound images

Visualizing and analyzing the morphological structure of carotid bifurcations are important for understanding the etiology of carotid atherosclerosis, which is a major cause of stroke and transient ischemic attack. For delineation of vasculatures in the carotid artery, ultrasound examinations have been widely employed because of a noninvasive procedure without ionizing radiation. However, conventional 2D ultrasound imaging has technical limitations in observing the complicated 3D shapes and asymmetric vasodilation of bifurcations. This study aims to propose image-processing techniques for better 3D reconstruction of a carotid bifurcation in a rat by using 2D cross-sectional ultrasound images. A high-resolution ultrasound imaging system with a probe centered at 40 MHz was employed to obtain 2D transversal images. The lumen boundaries in each transverse ultrasound image were detected by using three different techniques; an ellipse-fitting, a correlation mapping to visualize the decorrelation of blood flow, and the ellipse-fitting on the correlation map. When the results are compared, the third technique provides relatively good boundary extraction. The incomplete boundaries of arterial lumen caused by acoustic artifacts are somewhat resolved by adopting the correlation mapping and the distortion in the boundary detection near the bifurcation apex was largely reduced by using the ellipse-fitting technique. The 3D lumen geometry of a carotid artery was obtained by volumetric rendering of several 2D slices. For the 3D vasodilatation of the carotid bifurcation, lumen geometries at the contraction and expansion states were simultaneously depicted at various view angles. The present 3D reconstruction methods would be useful for efficient extraction and construction of the 3D lumen geometries of carotid bifurcations from 2D ultrasound images.     

Simulation of blood flow using extended Boltzmann kinetic approach

Lattice Boltzmann (LB) simulations are conducted to obtain the detailed hydrodynamics in a variety of blood vessel setups, including a prototype stented channel and four human coronary artery geometries based on the images obtained from real patients. For a model of stented flow involving an S-shape stent, a pulsatile flow rate is applied as the inlet boundary condition, and the time- and space-dependent flow field is computed. The LB simulation is found to reproduce the analytical solutions for the velocity profiles and wall shear stress distributions for the pulsatile channel flow. For the coronary arteries, the distributions of wall shear stress, which is important for clinical diagnostic purposes, are in good agreement with the conventional CFD predictions.     

Ultrasonically assisted evaluation of the impact of atherosclerotic plaque on the pulse pressure wave propagation: a clinical feasibility study

The purpose of this work was to evaluate ultrasound modality as a non-invasive tool for determination of impact of the degree of the atherosclerotic plaque located in human internal carotid arteries on the values of the parameters of the pulse wave. Specifically, the applicability of the method to such arteries as brachial, common, and internal carotid was examined. The method developed is based on analysis of two characteristic parameters: the value of the mean reflection coefficient modulus |Γ|_a of the blood pressure wave and time delay Δt between the forward (travelling) and backward (reflected) blood pressure waves. The blood pressure wave was determined from ultrasound measurements of the artery’s inner (internal) diameter, using the custom made wall tracking system (WTS) operating at 6.75 MHz. Clinical data were obtained from the carotid arteries measurements of 70 human subjects. These included the control group of 30 healthy individuals along with the patients diagnosed with the stenosis of the internal carotid artery (ICA) ranging from 20% to 99% or with the ICA occlusion. The results indicate that with increasing level of stenosis of the ICA the value of the mean reflection coefficient measured in the common carotid artery, significantly increases from |Γ|_a = 0.45 for healthy individuals to |Γ|_a = 0.61 for patients with stenosis level of 90-99%, or ICA occlusion. Similarly, the time delay Δt decreases from 52 ms to 25 ms for the respective groups. The method described holds promise that it might be clinically useful as a non-invasive tool for localization of distal severe artery narrowing, which can assist in identifying early stages of atherosclerosis especially in regions, which are inaccessible for the ultrasound probe (e.g. carotid sinus or middle cerebral artery).     

In vivo biomicroscopy with ultrasound 2

In the first article of this series it was shown that the use of inverse scattering theory to analyse ultrasound reflections could provide high resolution images of the acoustic impedance profile of the retina. Unlike the retina, most tissue structures of interest, like small tumours and arterial plaque deposits, are shielded from view by intervening layers of tissue of appreciable acoustic impedance and attenuation. By analysing a one-dimensional model for a plaque deposit on the wall of a carotid artery embedded in a 5 cm thick layer of tissue, we demonstrate that a relatively high quality image can be recovered when compensation for the attenuation of the intervening tissue is made. We observe that because of the dearth of low frequency power in the recovered signal of ultrasound transducers, it is important that the field of view imaged is not taken to be too large. We compare the exact iterative distorted wave Born approximation inverse scattering method with the approximate but computationally faster plane wave Born approximation method and find that they give images of comparable quality for this model.     

In vivo attenuation and equivalent scatterer size parameters for atherosclerotic carotid plaque: Preliminary results

We have previously reported on the equivalent scatterer size, attenuation coefficient, and axial strain properties of atherosclerotic plaque ex vivo. Since plaque structure and composition may be damaged during a carotid endarterectomy procedure, characterization of in vivo properties of atherosclerotic plaque is essential. The relatively shallow depth of the carotid artery and plaque enables non-invasive evaluation of carotid plaque utilizing high frequency linear-array transducers. We investigate the ability of the attenuation coefficient and equivalent scatterer size parameters to differentiate between calcified, and lipidic plaque tissue. Softer plaques especially lipid rich and those with a thin fibrous cap are more prone to rupture and can be classified as unstable or vulnerable plaque. Preliminary results were obtained from 10 human patients whose carotid artery was scanned in vivo to evaluate atherosclerotic plaque prior to a carotid endarterectomy procedure. Our results indicate that the equivalent scatterer size obtained using Faran’s scattering theory for calcified regions are in the 120–180 μm range while softer regions have larger equivalent scatterer size distribution in the 280–470 μm range. The attenuation coefficient for calcified regions as expected is significantly higher than that for softer regions. In the frequency bandwidth ranging from 2.5 to 7.5 MHz, the attenuation coefficient for calcified regions lies between 1.4 and 2.5 dB/cm/MHz, while that for softer regions lies between 0.3 and 1.3 dB/cm/MHz.     

Scatterer size estimation in pulse-echo ultrasound using focused sources: theoretical approximations and simulation analysis

The speckle in ultrasound images has long been thought to contain information related to the tissue microstructure. Many different investigators have analyzed the frequency characteristics of the backscattered signals to estimate the scatterer acoustic concentration and size. Previous work has been mostly restricted to unfocused or weakly focused ultrasound sources, thus limiting its implementation with diagnostically relevant fields. Herein, we derive equations capable of estimating the size of a scatterer for any reasonably focused source provided that the velocity potential field in the focal region can be approximated as a three-dimensional Gaussian beam, scatterers are a sufficient distance from the source, and the field is approximately constant across the scatterer. The calculations show that, when estimating the scatterer size, correcting for focusing requires a generalized attenuation-compensation function that includes both attenuation and focusing along the beam axis. The Gaussian approximation is validated by comparing the ideal velocity potential field for three spherically focused sources with f-numbers of 1, 2, and 4 to the Gaussian approximation for frequencies from 2 to 14 MHz. The theoretical derivations are evaluated by simulating the backscatter by using spherically focused sources (f-numbers of 1, 2, and 4) adjacent to attenuating media (0.05 to 1 dB/cm/MHz) that contain scatterers with Gaussian impedance distributions. The generalized attenuation-compensation function yielded results accurate to 7.2% while the traditional attenuation-compensation functions that neglected focusing had errors as high as 103%.     

Gaussian wavelet based dynamic filtering (GWDF) method for medical ultrasound systems

In this paper, a novel dynamic filtering method using Gaussian wavelet filters is proposed to remove noise from ultrasound echo signal. In the proposed method, a mother wavelet is first selected with its central frequency (CF) and frequency bandwidth (FB) equal to those of the transmitted signal. The actual frequency of the received signal at a given depth is estimated through the autocorrelation technique. Then the mother wavelet is dilated using the ratio between the transmitted central frequency and the actual frequency as the scale factor. The generated daughter wavelet is finally used as the dynamic filter at this depth. Frequency-demodulated Gaussian wavelet is chosen in this paper because its power spectrum is well-matched with that of the transmitted ultrasound signal. The proposed method is evaluated by simulations using Field II program. Experiments are also conducted out on a standard ultrasound phantom using a 192-element transducer with the center frequency of 5 MHz. The phantom contains five point targets, five circular high scattering regions with diameters of 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 mm respectively, and five cysts with diameters of 6, 5, 4, 3, 2 mm respectively. Both simulation and experimental results show that optimal signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) can be obtained and useful information can be extracted along the depth direction irrespective of the diagnostic objects.     

3D dynamical ultrasonic model of pulsating vessel walls

The aim of this work is to introduce a novel 3-D model of pulsating vessels, through which the dynamic acoustic response of arterial regions can be predicted. Blood flow is numerically simulated by considering the fluid-dynamic displacements of the scatterers (erythrocytes), while a mechanical model calculates the wall displacement due to fluid pressure. The acoustic characteristics of each region are simulated through the FIELD software. Two numerical phantoms of a carotid artery surrounded by elastic tissue have been developed to illustrate the model. One of them includes a plaque involving a 50% stenosis. B-mode and M-mode images are produced and segmented to obtain the wall displacement profile. A cylindrical holed phantom made of cryogel mimicking material has been constructed for the model validation. In pulsatile flow conditions, fluid and wall displacements have been measured by Doppler ultrasound methods and quantitatively compared to simulated M-mode images, showing a fairly good agreement.     

A quadrature demodulation method based on tracking the ultrasound echo frequency

The ultrasound echo attenuation depends on frequency, propagating depth and tissue characteristics. Thus, the attenuation dependent on frequency results in a larger attenuation of high frequencies than lower when the wave propagates through the tissue. As a result, the central frequency of the echo generates the increasing downshift with the increasing of depth. In the traditional I/Q demodulation method, it is assumed that the central frequency of the echo is the same as the transmitting frequency and unchanged all time. The assumption directly causes that the acquired I/Q signals are not perfect baseband ones but biased due to the echo attenuation. In addition, the unreasonable assumption will keep the echo from getting better signal-to-noise ratio. A quadrature demodulation method based on tracking the ultrasound echo frequency is proposed in this paper. The method consists of the traditional I/Q demodulator, the frequency tracking module, the phase compensation module and the dynamic filtering module. The outputs of I/Q demodulator are biased. Autocorrelation technique is utilized in the frequency tracking unit to estimate the frequency bias according to the outputs of I/Q demodulator. The estimated bias feeds to the phase compensation unit which can eliminate the frequency bias by simple trigonometric function transform. The compensated signals feed to the dynamic filter and are further processed. The bandwidth of the dynamic filter decreases with the increasing of the depth, which makes the echo acquire better SNR in different depth. The efficiency of the proposed method is testified by both simulations and experiments.     

局域基谐波频谱峰值比的超声图像融合

提出一种局域基谐波频谱峰值比(LFHR)的超声图像融合方法。首先,分离超声射频信号基谐波,计算二者的局域频谱峰值比,确定融合权值;然后,加权平均基谐波成分,得到融合射频信号;最后,经过希尔伯特变换、对数压缩、插值/降采样生成B超融合图像。非均匀囊肿组织模型仿真结果表明,LFHR法获取的融合图像较原始图像的对比度、对比度噪声比、组织杂波比分别提高2.44倍、2.80倍及3.22倍,谐波成分谱能量提高83%。人体颈动脉临床实验结果进一步验证了LFHR法的有效性。综上,LFHR法获得了组织轮廓清晰内部细节丰富的B超融合图像,图像质量显著提高。      

Ultrasonic pelvimetry. A method for preliminary estimation of the pelvic outlet

Vaginal sound, with transmitter crystals of 2 MHz, is used when measuring the interspinous diameter. The echo from the pelvic wall, the effect on the measured spinal diameter by altering the position of the ultrasonic transmitter, and the influence of air or faeces between the ultrasound transmitter and the pelvic wall, have been analysed in a series of model trials on a dummy submerged in water. Thereafter clinical trials were performed on 102 women, pregnant in their 9th month. The results obtained when measuring the interspinous diameter on the ultrasonic tomogram were compared with the results obtained when measuring the same distance on a frontal x-ray picture taken using the orthographic technique according to Borell-Frenström. The method is suitable for selecting those cases with suspect constriction of the pelvic outlet for an x-ray examination by the Borell-Fernström technique.     

Computerized quantification of carotid artery stenosis using MRA axial images

Currently, the North American symptomatic carotid endarterectomy trial, European carotid surgery trial, and common carotid method are used to measure the carotid stenosis for determining candidates for carotid endarterectomy using the projection angiography from different modalities such as digital subtraction angiography, rotational angiography, computed tomography angiography and magnetic resonance angiography. A new computerized carotid stenosis measuring system was developed using MR angiography axial image to overcome the drawbacks of conventional carotid stenosis measuring methods, to reduce the variability of inter-observer and intra-observer. The gray-level thresholding is one of the most popular and efficient methods for image segmentation. We segmented the carotid artery and lumen from three-dimensional time-of-flight MRA axial images using gray-level thresholding technique. Using the measured intima-media thickness value of common carotid artery for each case, we separated carotid artery wall from the segmented carotid artery region. After that, the regions of segmented carotid without artery wall were divided into region of blood flow and plaque. The calculation of carotid stenosis degree was performed as follows: carotid stenosis grading = (area measure of plaque/area measure of blood flow region and plaque) * 100%. No previous study has developed the carotid stenosis measuring method using MRA axial image. The new computerized stenosis measuring system has advantage over conventional caliper measuring methods; it will not only greatly increase the speed of stenosis measuring but also reduce the variability between readers. It should also reduce the variability between different institutions.     

Modeling of the nanoparticle coagulation in pulsed radio-frequency capacitively coupled C_2H_2 discharges

The role of pulse parameters on nanoparticle property is investigated self-consistently based on a couple of fluid model and aerosol dynamics model in a capacitively coupled parallel-plate acetylene(C2H2) discharge. In this model, the mass continuity equation, momentum balance equation, and energy balance equation for neutral gas are taken into account.Thus, the thermophoretic force arises when a gas temperature gradient exists. The typical results of this model are positive and negative ion densities, electron impact collisions rates, nanoparticle density, and charge distributions. The simulation is performed for duty ratio 0.4/0.7/1.0, as well as pulse modulation frequency from 40 k Hz to 2.7 MHz for pure C2H2 discharges at a pressure of 500 m Torr. We find that the pulse parameters, especially the duty ratio, have a great affect on the dissociative attachment coefficient and the negative density. More importantly, by decreasing the duty ratio, nanoparticles start to diffuse to the wall. Under the action of gas flow, nanoparticle density peak is created in front of the pulse electrode,where the gas temperature is smaller.     

Comparison of carotid vessel wall area measurements using three different contrast-weighted black blood MR imaging techniques

Measuring carotid artery plaque burden from MRI is a reliable method for monitoring regression and progression of atherosclerosis. However, to measure all available images would be very time consuming, and in practice the image quality (IQ) of these images may be inconsistent, which can directly impact the quality of measurement. It is hypothesized that if IQ is comparable among different contrast weighted images, then carotid artery area measurements obtained from different contrast images of the same location will produce identical results. To test this, T1, proton density and T2 weighted images were acquired from ten patients (51 +/- 7 years old). Carotid lumen and vessel wall area was measured using a custom designed software program. The results showed strong agreement evidenced with only small differences on both lumen (mean: 40.5 mm(2)) and wall (mean: 52.6 mm(2)) area measurement among different weighted images. The maximum absolute mean differences are less than 2.7 mm(2) and 4.4 mm(2), and 90(th) percentile of the absolute differences are 5.6 mm(2) and 8.2 mm(2) respectively. In conclusion, different contrast weighted images with high and comparable IQ will yield similar results in lumen and vessel wall area measurement. At each matched location, it is recommended that the image with the highest IQ be used for area measurement.     

Numerical modeling of microbubble backscatter to optimize ultrasound particle image velocimetry imaging: initial studies

We have developed a promising non-invasive ultrasound-based method for performing particle image velocimetry (PIV) in vivo. This method, termed echo PIV, provides multi-component blood velocity data with good (2 ms) temporal resolution. The method takes advantage of the non-linear ultrasound backscatter characteristics of small gas-filled microbubbles (ultrasound contrast) that are seeded into the blood stream. In this study, we use a numerical model to explore potential areas to focus future work in echo PIV.

Ultrasound backscatter from encapsulated microbubbles was modeled using a modified Rayleigh–Plesset equation (Church model, 1995), taking into account the protein/lipid shell layer as a thick, mass-conserving incompressible fluid surrounded by incompressible blood-like fluid. The equation of motion was solved numerically to characterize the fundamental and second harmonic components of the backscattered pressure. Results show a significant advantage in using the second harmonic component for echo PIV, especially for small bubble sizes less than 3 μm in diameter at 2.2 MHz frequency. The effect of the shell thickness ranging from 10 to 500 nm on the vibration amplitude of the bubble was examined and it is shown that the presence of the shell requires mechanical index (MI)>0.2 of incident pressure amplitude to improve bubble detectability. Analysis of the effect of pulse length shows a tradeoff between axial resolution (short pulse length) and bubble detectability (longer pulse length) will most likely be required. The effect of varying MI between 0.1 and 0.6 was also studied at a center frequency of 2.2 MHz and the results indicate that the resonance of the second harmonic is maximized for bubbles with diameter of approximately 2.75 μm. Bubble non-linearities at MI>0.2 induced a resonant frequency shift away from the integer multiple of the incident frequency in the second harmonic backscatter. For a given bubble size, there is a combination of optimal incident frequency and mechanical index range that maximizes the ratio of the second harmonic compared to the fundamental. This resonant frequency decreases with increasing bubble radius. Further, a narrow bandwidth pulse is shown to increase signal strength. Both of these effects may cause conflict with factors governing spatial resolution. Optimization of the incident frequency, microbubble size and mechanical index to enhance bubble detectability will depend on the particular clinical application. These theoretical predictions provide further understanding of the physics behind our echo PIV technique, and should be useful for guiding the design of echo PIV systems.     

Microelectronics mounted on a piezoelectric transducer: method, simulations, and measurements

This paper describes the design of a highly integrated ultrasound sensor where the piezoelectric ceramic transducer is used as the carrier for the driver electronics. Intended as one part in a complete portable, battery operated ultrasound sensor system, focus has been to achieve small size and low power consumption. An optimized ASIC driver stage is mounted directly on the piezoelectric transducer and connected using wire bond technology. The absence of wiring between driver and transducer provides excellent pulse control possibilities and eliminates the need for broad band matching networks. Estimates of the sensor power consumption are made based on the capacitive behavior of the piezoelectric transducer. System behavior and power consumption are simulated using SPICE models of the ultrasound transducer together with transistor level modelling of the driver stage. Measurements and simulations are presented of system power consumption and echo energy in a pulse echo setup. It is shown that the power consumption varies with the excitation pulse width, which also affects the received ultrasound energy in a pulse echo setup. The measured power consumption for a 16 mm diameter 4.4 MHz piezoelectric transducer varies between 95 microW and 130 microW at a repetition frequency of 1 kHz. As a lower repetition frequency gives a linearly lower power consumption, very long battery operating times can be achieved. The measured results come very close to simulations as well as estimated ideal minimum power consumption.     

高频聚焦超声声场和温度场的仿真研究

为探究临床常用的7 MHz高频聚焦超声在多层生物组织中的声传播以及毫秒级时间内的生物传热规律问题,基于Westervelt方程和Pennes传热方程,使用有限元方法建立高频聚焦超声辐照多层组织的非线性热黏性声传播及传热模型。首先分析了线性模型和非线性模型之间的差异,然后在非线性模型下探究换能器的参数对声场和温度场的影响。仿真结果显示：在7 MHz频率下,当换能器输出声功率超过5 W时,声波传播的非线性效应不可忽视(p <0.05);当声功率从5 W增大到15 W时,非线性模型与线性模型预测的温度偏差从20%增加到34.703%;高频聚焦超声波的非线性行为比低频更加显著,基频能量向高次谐波转移的程度增大,声功率为10 W和15 W时4次谐波与基波之比分别达到7.33%和12.12%;高频换能器参数的改变对组织中声场和温度场分布的影响较大,换能器焦距从12 mm减小到11.2 mm,焦点处最高温度增加了77%。结果表明,7 MHz聚焦超声的非线性声传播需要考虑到4次谐波的影响。该文提出的多层组织非线性仿真模型可为高频聚焦超声换能器参数优化及制定安全、有效的术前治疗方案提供理论参考。     

Attenuation in trabecular bone: A comparison between numerical simulation and experimental results in human femur

Numerical simulations (finite-difference time domain) are compared to experimental results of ultrasound wave propagation through human trabecular bones. Three-dimensional high-resolution microcomputed tomography reconstructions served as input geometry for the simulation. The numerical simulation took into account scattering, but not absorption. Simulated and experimental values of the attenuation coefficients (alpha, dB/cm) and the normalized broadband ultrasound attenuation (nBUA, dB/cm/MHz) were measured and compared on a set of 28 samples. While experimental and simulated nBUA values were highly correlated (R(2)=0.83), and showed a similar dependence with bone volume fraction, the simulation correctly predicted experimental nBUA values only for low bone volume fraction (BV/TV). Attenuation coefficients were underestimated by the simulation. The absolute difference between experimental and simulated alpha values increased with both BV/TV and frequency. As a function of frequency, the relative difference between experimental and simulated alpha values decreased from 60% around 400 kHz to 30% around 1.2 MHz. Under the assumption that the observed discrepancy expresses the effect of the absorption, our results suggests that nBUA and its dependence on BV/TV can be mostly explained by scattering, and that the relative contribution of scattering to alpha increases with frequency, becoming predominant (>50 %) over absorption for frequencies above 600 kHz.