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Bioresorbable vascular scaffold (BVS) has recently been spotlighted for its unique characteristics of absorbing into blood vessels and eventually disappearing. Although intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) is the most common guiding tool for stent deployment, the echogenicity of BVS struts has changed as the center of stent lumen and scanning rotation is not concentric, which may cause a critical erroneous measurement in practice. This study investigated the physical conditions for dimming the stent brightness in IVUS images using a finite-difference method (FDM) to numerically solve acoustic wave propagation through nonhomogeneous medium. The dimmed brightness is caused by an angled rectangular cross section of a strut and its similar acoustic impedance with water. Imaging frequency is not a major cause. However, the angle between the acoustic beam and the BVS surface is the major cause of the dimmed brightness. As a solution, an approach using a frequency compounding method with signal polarity comparator was proposed to recover the reduced brightness without sacrificing spatial resolutions. Based on the simulation study, the signal level from BVS can be attenuated down by 17 dB when the angle between the acoustic beamline and the surface of BVS is more than 45°. With the proposed frequency compounding approach, the reduced signal can be recovered by 6 dB. In the experimental BVS IVUS imaging, strut brightness was reduced by 18 dB with an angled strut position and recovered by 5 dB with the proposed frequency compounding method. A pig coronary was imaged to demonstrate the performance of the proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: For accurate diagnosis of atherosclerosis, the high spatial and contrast resolutions of intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) images are a key requirement. Increasing the center frequency of IVUS is a simple solution to meet this requirement. However, this leads to a reduction in imaging depth due to the frequency-dependent attenuation of ultrasound. Here, we report a recently developed dual-element IVUS transducer for tissue harmonic imaging (THI) and frequency compounding to increase the spatial and contrast resolutions of IVUS images, while maintaining the imaging depth to assess the overall morphological change of blood vessels. Methods: One 35-MHz element is used for producing general IVUS images and the other 70-MHz element is for receiving the second harmonic signals induced by the 35-MHz ultrasound. The fundamental and second harmonic signals can also be used for frequency compound imaging to further improve contrast resolution. The spatial and contrast resolutions achieved by the developed transducer were evaluated through wire and tissue-mimicking phantom imaging tests. Additionally, the images of a stent deployed in a tissue-mimicking phantom and an excised pig artery were acquired to assess clinical usefulness of the transducer. Results: The results demonstrated that the developed IVUS transducer enables us to simultaneously examine the overall morphological change of blood vessels by the 35-MHz ultrasound images and the near vessel layers such as the intima, the media, and the adventitia by either THI or compound images with high spatial and contrast resolutions. In addition, the developed transducer facilitates the simultaneous acquisition of 35- and 70-MHz fundamental images when needed. Conclusion: The developed dual-element IVUS transducer makes it possible to fully realize the potential benefits of IVUS in the diagnosis of atherosclerosis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tissue harmonic imaging (THI), an essential mode of commercial ultrasound imaging scanners, can provide images with high spatial and contrast resolutions. For THI, the frequency spectrum of a transducer is generally divided for the transmission of fundamental signal and the reception of its second harmonic. Therefore, it is difficult to use the THI mode for intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) imaging because typical IVUS transducers have a narrow −6-dB fractional bandwidth of about 50%. Due to its small aperture (about 0.5 mm) and the strength of IVUS being too weak, it is difficult to construct a high-quality tissue harmonic image. In this paper, we report a recently developed dual-frequency oblong-shaped-focused IVUS transducer for high-quality intravascular THI; the transducer consists of three elements arranged side by side in the horizontal (i.e., elevation) direction. The two outer elements with a center frequency of 35 MHz are responsible for ultrasound transmission and the center element has a center frequency of 70 MHz for the reception of the second-harmonic signals. All three elements have a spherical shape with a radius of 3 mm to efficiently generate harmonics in the region of interest. This configuration of the developed IVUS transducer was determined to facilitate high-quality THI, which was based on the results of Field II simulation and finite-element analysis. The images of wires and a tissue-mimicking phantom indicated that the tissue harmonic images produced by the developed transducer have not only a high spatial resolution but also a deep imaging depth, compared to the 35- and 70-MHz fundamental images. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) imaging, a transducer is inserted into a blood vessel and rotated to obtain image data. For this purpose, the transducer aperture is typically less than 0.5 mm in diameter, which causes natural focusing to occur in the imaging depth ranging from 1 to 5 mm. Due to the small aperture, however, it is not viable to conduct geometric focusing in order to enhance the spatial resolution of IVUS images. Furthermore, this hampers narrowing the slice thickness of a cross-sectional scan plane in the imaging depth, which leads to lowering spatial and contrast resolutions of IVUS images. To solve this problem, we propose an oblong-shaped-focused transducer for IVUS imaging. Unlike the conventional IVUS transducers with either a circular or a square flat aperture, the proposed transducer has an oblong aperture of which long side is positioned along a blood vessel. This unique configuration makes it possible to conduct geometric focusing at a desired depth in the elevation direction. In this study, furthermore, it is demonstrated that a spherically shaped aperture in both lateral and elevation directions also improves lateral resolution, compared to the conventional flat aperture. To ascertain this, the conventional and the proposed IVUS transducers were designed and fabricated to evaluate and to compare their imaging performances through wire phantom and tissue-mimicking phantom experiments. For the proposed 50-MHz IVUS transducer, a PZT piece of 0.5 × 1.0 mm2 was spherically shaped for elevation focus at 3 mm by using the conventional press-focusing technique whereas the conventional one has a flat aperture of 0.5 × 0.5 mm2. The experimental results demonstrated that the proposed IVUS transducer is capable of improving spatial and contrast resolutions of IVUS images. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) is a valuable imaging modality for the diagnosis of atherosclerosis. It provides useful clinical information, such as lumen size, vessel wall thickness, and plaque composition, by providing a cross-sectional vascular image. For several decades, IVUS has made remarkable progress in improving the accuracy of diagnosing cardiovascular disease that remains the leading cause of death globally. As the quality of IVUS images mainly depends on the performance of the IVUS transducer, various IVUS transducers have been developed. Therefore, in this review, recently developed mechanically rotating IVUS transducers, especially ones exploiting piezoelectric ceramics or single crystals, are discussed. In addition, this review addresses the history and technical challenges in the development of IVUS transducers and the prospects of next-generation IVUS transducers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]