Ultrasound-heated photoacoustic flowmetry

作者：Wang Lidai; Yao Junjie; Maslov Konstantin I; Xing Wenxin; Wang Lihong V^*

来源：Journal of Biomedical Optics, 2013, 18(11): 117003.

DOI：10.1117/1.JBO.18.11.117003

• photoacoustic microscopy
• flow
• thermal clearance
• high-intensity focused ultrasound
• deep imaging

We report the development of photoacoustic flowmetry assisted by high-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU). This novel method employs HIFU to generate a heating impulse in the flow medium, followed by photoacoustic monitoring of the thermal decay process. Photoacoustic flowmetry in a continuous medium remains a challenge in the optical diffusive regime. Here, both the HIFU heating and photoacoustic detection can focus at depths beyond the optical diffusion limit (similar to 1 mm in soft tissue). This method can be applied to a continuous medium, i.e., a medium without discrete scatterers or absorbers resolvable by photoacoustic imaging. Flow speeds up to 41 mm . s(-1) have been experimentally measured in a blood phantom covered by 1.5-mm-thick tissue.

• 出版日期2013-11