Building better bubbles for ultrasound could enhance image quality, facilitate treatments
Building better bubbles for ultrasound could enhance image quality, facilitate treatments
Share:
Karen R. Olsen
Ultrasound is a non-invasive technique that uses sound waves to either generate images of tissues inside of the body, or to interact with tissues as a therapeutic tool – to break up gallstones, increase blood flow, or ablate tumors, for instance. Ultrasound contrast agents, which are typically tiny bubbles filled with gas, can enhance the reflection of ultrasound waves to improve the quality of an ultrasound image. However, commercially available contrast agents are confined to the blood vessels, typically remain in the bloodstream for less than 10 minutes, and are used in only a handful of settings in the United States.
E-Mail
IMAGE: Schematic of bubble membrane showing the influence of membrane stiffener and membrane softener in the phospholipid packing. view more
Credit: Amin Jafari Sojahrood and Al C. de Leon
If you were given ultrasound in a word association game, sound wave might easily come to mind. But in recent years, a new term has surfaced: bubbles. Those ephemeral, globular shapes are proving useful in improving medical imaging, disease detection and targeted drug delivery. There s just one glitch: bubbles fizzle out soon after injection into the bloodstream.
Now, after 10 years work, a multidisciplinary research team has built a better bubble. Their new formulations have resulted in nanoscale bubbles with customizable outer shells so small and durable that they can travel to and penetrate some of the most inaccessible areas in the human body.