Development of ultrasound-based integrated techniques for biomechanical and bioacoustical characterization of tissue

开发基于超声的组织生物力学和生物声学表征集成技术

• 批准号: RGPIN-2016-06472
• 负责人: SadeghiNaini, Ali
• 金额: $ 1.97万
• 依托单位: York University
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2020-01-01 至 2021-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=707975
• 关键词: Development; ultrasound; based; integrated; techniques

Breast and prostate cancers are the most frequent form of cancers diagnosed in women and men, respectively. Early diagnosis and prognosis are crucial for these cancer patients; with early diagnosis more therapeutics options can be considered whereas with early prognosis effective therapy adjustments can be facilitated for the patients on an individual basis. Tumour formation and its degeneration in response to treatment frequently alter tissue composition and microstructures, and consequently its biomechanical and bioacoustical characteristics. Therefore novel imaging technologies that permit volumetric and simultaneous quantification of tissue biomechanical and bioacoustical properties within the whole breast/prostate can potentially facilitate early diagnosis and prognosis for cancer patients with a high sensitivity. The overarching goal of this research program is to develop novel techniques within an integrated ultrasound-based framework to characterize biomechanical and bioacoustical properties of tissue in breast and prostate non-invasively. Specifically, our short-term objective is to design, develop and evaluate novel techniques for 3D ultrasound elastography and quantitative ultrasound imaging of whole breast/prostate to derive measures of tissue biomechanical and bioacoustical properties concurrently. Utilizing ultrasound as the imaging modality to collect raw data, our proposed framework has the advantage of being non-invasive, inexpensive and portable, in addition to having rapid imaging speed with high spatial resolution. The techniques developed in this program will be evaluated using computer simulations, followed by comprehensive studies on several tissue-mimicking phantoms with different characteristics designed specifically for breast or prostate. Over the long-term, we aim to ultrasonically characterize various normal and abnormal tissue types including healthy and cancerous tissues at different stages of disease, and at different stages of response development to anti-cancer therapies. A simultaneous characterization of different tissue properties enables us to investigate tumour formation and degeneration process from various points of view at cellular and tissue levels. Such a multi-view investigation can provide better insight into the different biophysical mechanisms involved in both tumour formation and degeneration, and the possible mutual impacts of such mechanisms on each other. We expect the complementary information provided by an integrated quantification of different tissue characteristics will increase the sensitivity, specificity and robustness in cancer diagnosis and prognosis applications. The proposed framework, therefore, can eventually facilitate breast and prostate cancer detection at early stages and permit therapy response evaluation rapidly after the start of a treatment.

乳腺癌和前列腺癌分别是女性和男性中最常见的癌症形式。早期诊断和预后对于这些癌症患者至关重要；通过早期诊断，可以考虑更多的治疗选择，而通过早期预后，可以根据患者的个体情况进行有效的治疗调整。肿瘤的形成及其对治疗的反应经常改变组织成分和微观结构，从而改变其生物力学和生物声学特征。因此，允许对整个乳房/前列腺内的组织生物力学和生物声学特性进行体积和同步量化的新型成像技术可能会以高灵敏度促进癌症患者的早期诊断和预后。 该研究计划的总体目标是在基于超声的集成框架内开发新技术，以非侵入性地表征乳房和前列腺组织的生物力学和生物声学特性。具体来说，我们的短期目标是设计、开发和评估全乳房/前列腺的 3D 超声弹性成像和定量超声成像新技术，以同时获得组织生物力学和生物声学特性的测量结果。我们提出的框架利用超声波作为成像方式来收集原始数据，除了具有快速成像速度和高空间分辨率之外，还具有非侵入性、廉价和便携的优点。该计划开发的技术将使用计算机模拟进行评估，然后对几种专门为乳房或前列腺设计的具有不同特征的组织模仿体模进行综合研究。 从长远来看，我们的目标是对各种正常和异常组织类型进行超声表征，包括处于不同疾病阶段以及抗癌治疗反应发展不同阶段的健康组织和癌组织。不同组织特性的同时表征使我们能够从细胞和组织水平的不同角度研究肿瘤的形成和退化过程。这种多视角研究可以更好地了解肿瘤形成和退化所涉及的不同生物物理机制，以及这些机制之间可能的相互影响。我们期望通过对不同组织特征的综合量化提供的补充信息将提高癌症诊断和预后应用的敏感性、特异性和稳健性。因此，所提出的框架最终可以促进乳腺癌和前列腺癌的早期检测，并允许在治疗开始后快速评估治疗反应。