title: Quantitative elasticity measurement of urinary bladder wall using laser-induced surface acoustic waves.
abstract: The maintenance of urinary bladder elasticity is essential to its functions, including the storage and voiding phases of the micturition cycle. The bladder stiffness can be changed by various pathophysiological conditions. Quantitative measurement of bladder elasticity is an essential step toward understanding various urinary bladder disease processes and improving patient care. As a nondestructive, and noncontact method, laser-induced surface acoustic waves (SAWs) can accurately characterize the elastic properties of different layers of organs such as the urinary bladder. This initial investigation evaluates the feasibility of a noncontact, all-optical method of generating and measuring the elasticity of the urinary bladder. Quantitative elasticity measurements of ex vivo porcine urinary bladder were made using the laser-induced SAW technique. A pulsed laser was used to excite SAWs that propagated on the bladder wall surface. A dedicated phase-sensitive optical coherence tomography (PhS-OCT) system remotely recorded the SAWs, from which the elasticity properties of different layers of the bladder were estimated. During the experiments, series of measurements were performed under five precisely controlled bladder volumes using water to estimate changes in the elasticity in relation to various urinary bladder contents. The results, validated by optical coherence elastography, show that the laser-induced SAW technique combined with PhS-OCT can be a feasible method of quantitative estimation of biomechanical properties.
authors.affiliation: Division of Imaging Technology, School of Medicine, University of Dundee, Dundee DD1 9SY, Scotland, UK.
authors.forename: Chunhui
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: School of Engineering, Physics and Mathematics, University of Dundee, Dundee DD1 4HN, Scotland, UK ; Department of Bioengineering, University of Washington, 3720 15th Ave. NE, Seattle, WA 98195, USA.
authors.forename: Guangying
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Guan
authors.affiliation: School of Engineering, Physics and Mathematics, University of Dundee, Dundee DD1 4HN, Scotland, UK.
authors.forename: Fan
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: School of Engineering, Physics and Mathematics, University of Dundee, Dundee DD1 4HN, Scotland, UK ; Department of Bioengineering, University of Washington, 3720 15th Ave. NE, Seattle, WA 98195, USA.
authors.forename: Shaozhen
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Song
authors.affiliation: School of Engineering, Physics and Mathematics, University of Dundee, Dundee DD1 4HN, Scotland, UK ; Department of Bioengineering, University of Washington, 3720 15th Ave. NE, Seattle, WA 98195, USA.
authors.forename: Ruikang K
authors.initials: RK
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: School of Engineering, Physics and Mathematics, University of Dundee, Dundee DD1 4HN, Scotland, UK.
authors.forename: Zhihong
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Huang
authors.affiliation: Division of Imaging Technology, School of Medicine, University of Dundee, Dundee DD1 9SY, Scotland, UK.
authors.forename: Ghulam
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Nabi
keywords: (110.4500) Optical coherence tomography; (240.6690) Surface waves; (280.3375) Laser induced ultrasonics