3-D ultrafast Doppler imaging applied to the noninvasive mapping of blood vessels in vivo.
Ultrafast Doppler imaging was introduced as a technique to quantify blood flow in an entire 2-D field of view, expanding the field of application of ultrasound imaging to the highly sensitive anatomical and functional mapping of blood vessels. We have recently developed 3-D ultrafast ultrasound imaging, a technique that can produce thousands of ultrasound volumes per second, based on a 3-D plane and diverging wave emissions, and demonstrated its clinical feasibility in human subjects in vivo. In this study, we show that noninvasive 3-D ultrafast power Doppler, pulsed Doppler, and color Doppler imaging can be used to perform imaging of blood vessels in humans when using coherent compounding of 3-D tilted plane waves. A customized, programmable, 1024-channel ultrasound system was designed to perform 3-D ultrafast imaging. Using a 32 × 32, 3-MHz matrix phased array (Vermon, Tours, France), volumes were beamformed by coherently compounding successive tilted plane wave emissions. Doppler processing was then applied in a voxel-wise fashion. The proof of principle of 3-D ultrafast power Doppler imaging was first performed by imaging Tygon tubes of various diameters, and in vivo feasibility was demonstrated by imaging small vessels in the human thyroid. Simultaneous 3-D color and pulsed Doppler imaging using compounded emissions were also applied in the carotid artery and the jugular vein in one healthy volunteer.
Jean
J
Provost
Clement
C
Papadacci
Charlie
C
Demene
Jean-Luc
JL
Gennisson
Mickael
M
Tanter
Mathieu
M
Pernot
D001808:Blood Vessels / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D006801:Humans; D021621:Imaging, Three-Dimensional / Q000379:methods*; D019047:Phantoms, Imaging; D013961:Thyroid Gland / Q000098:blood supply / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D018608:Ultrasonography, Doppler / Q000379:methods*