Abstract
The ability to measure the elastic properties of plaques and vessels would be useful in clinical diagnoses, particularly for detecting a vulnerable plaque. This study demonstrates the feasibility of the combination of intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) and acoustic radiation force elasticity imaging for detecting the distribution of stiffness within atherosclerotic arteries ex vivo. A dual-frequency IVUS transducer with two elements was used to induce the propagation of the shear wave (by the 8.5 MHz pushing element) which could be simultaneously monitored by the 31 MHz imaging element. The wave-amplitude image and the wave-velocity image were reconstructed by measuring the peak displacement and wave velocity of shear wave propagation, respectively. System performance was verified using gelatin phantoms. The phantom results demonstrate that the stiffness differences of shear modulus of 1.6 kPa can be distinguished through the wave-amplitude and wave-velocity images. The stiffness distributions of the atherosclerotic aorta from a rabbit were obtained, for which the values of peak displacement and the shear wave velocity were 3.7 ± 1.2 µm and 0.38 ± 0.19 m s−1 for the lipid-rich plaques, and 1.0 ± 0.2 µm and 3.45 ± 0.45 m s−1 for the arterial walls, respectively. These results indicate that IVUS elasticity imaging can be used to distinguish the elastic properties of plaques and vessels.
Highlights
The ability to measure the elastic properties of plaques and vessels would be useful in clinical diagnoses, for detecting a vulnerable plaque
This study demonstrates the feasibility of the combination of intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) and acoustic radiation force elasticity imaging for detecting the distribution of stiffness within atherosclerotic arteries ex vivo
The stiffness distributions of the atherosclerotic aorta from a rabbit were obtained, for which the values of peak displacement and the shear wave velocity were 3.7 ± 1.2 μm and 0.38 ± 0.19 m s−1 for the lipid-rich plaques, and 1.0 ± 0.2 μm and 3.45 ± 0.45 m s−1 for the arterial walls, respectively. These results indicate that IVUS elasticity imaging can be used to distinguish the elastic properties of plaques and vessels
Summary
The ability to measure the elastic properties of plaques and vessels would be useful in clinical diagnoses, for detecting a vulnerable plaque. The stiffness distributions of the atherosclerotic aorta from a rabbit were obtained, for which the values of peak displacement and the shear wave velocity were 3.7 ± 1.2 μm and 0.38 ± 0.19 m s−1 for the lipid-rich plaques, and 1.0 ± 0.2 μm and 3.45 ± 0.45 m s−1 for the arterial walls, respectively These results indicate that IVUS elasticity imaging can be used to distinguish the elastic properties of plaques and vessels. In 1991, Ophir et al developed an imaging technique called elastography to measure the elastic properties of soft tissue based on applying an external force to the tissue and measuring its deformation at different depths This method can be used to reconstruct the stiffness distributions within the tissue according to its internal strain profile along the transducer axis [15]. This produces slight errors in the pressure measurements that would cause considerable errors in estimations of elastic properties [19]
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