Contribution
Fast volumetric super-resolution ultrasound imaging
* Presenting author
Abstract:
This talk presents a method for 3D contrast-free SUper Resolution ultrasound imaging using the Erythrocytes (3D SURE) and a row-column array. In vivo data were acquired from the exposed kidney of a Sprague-Dawley rat by a Verasonics Vantage 256 scanner using a Vermon 6 MHz, 128 + 128 elements row column probe with 48 virtual sources for a 250 Hz volume rate. Tissue motion was compensated for using 3D speckle tracking to estimate the motion in every voxel as a function of time and space, and spline interpolation was employed for sub-voxel precision registration to the first volume. Fourier ring correlation gave a resolution of 161 micrometers for 8 s of data, indicating an improvement in resolution of 1.9 to 4.8 times. 3D SURE can yield high-resolution volumes at 250 Hz with an RF data rate of 2.6 GBytes, 8 times smaller than for a 32 x 32 matrix array with a 4 times lower F-number in the lateral and elevation direction. Detecting peak positions in the echo canceled volume revealed vessels with sizes down to 161 micrometers, and volumes can be reconstructed for less than 1 second of data, making the approach easily translatable to clinical use.