Advancing Ultrasound Therapy and Imaging: Towards High-Precision, Real-time Solutions

Abstract:
Achieving high-precision diagnosis and therapy with ultrasound is challenging due to the heterogeneous nature of biological tissues. This seminar will present recent technological advances in ultrasound to improve both imaging performance and therapeutic capability.

The first part of the seminar will introduce transcranial histotripsy as a non-invasive brain therapy. Histotripsy is a non-thermal, non-ionizing ultrasound therapy that mechanically fractionates target tissue through acoustic cavitation generated by short, high-intensity ultrasound pulses. Transcranial histotripsy is particularly challenging because the intact human skull introduces severe attenuation and phase aberration. This seminar will discuss the specialized instrumentation for transcranial histotripsy, methods to ensure precise targeting and real-time monitoring (including skull aberration correction and cavitation imaging), and feasibility and safety evaluation of transcranial histotripsy in preclinical studies.

The second half of the seminar will focus on ultrafast ultrasound imaging using large-aperture arrays. By combining ultrafast acquisition techniques with parallel computing, this approach enables high-resolution volumetric imaging over a large field of view at video-rate frame rates. Two clinically relevant applications will be presented: panoramic spine imaging for diagnosis and interventional guidance, and breast ultrasound tomography for early cancer screening. Finally, we will discuss remaining technical challenges for clinical translation and highlight how advances in ultrafast imaging can be integrated with histotripsy to enable safer, more precise therapies.

Bio:
Dr. Ning Lu is a Senior Ultrasound Engineer at United Imaging Healthcare North America in Bellevue, Washington. She completed her postdoctoral training in the Department of Radiology at Stanford University under the mentorship of Prof. Katherine W. Ferrara, where she developed high-resolution 3D ultrasound imaging techniques for diagnostic and interventional guidance. Dr. Lu received her Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering and Scientific Computing (joint degree) from the University of Michigan in 2023, working with Prof. Zhen Xu on MR-guided transcranial histotripsy for non-invasive brain therapy. Her research interests include biomedical ultrasound, medical instrumentation, parallel computing, and AI-driven imaging science. Her long-term career goal is to develop high-precision, affordable, personalized ultrasound solutions for therapy, diagnosis, and health monitoring.