Investigating the effects of intensity threshold on high-frequency three-dimensional power Doppler ultrasound.

Abstract

High-frequency power Doppler ultrasound is a non-invasive vascular imaging modality ideal for a quantitative assessment of vascularity in preclinical models. Although it permits detecting slower blood flows than other ultrasound Doppler methods, it is limited by flow artifacts, complicating the interpretation of tumor vascularity metrics such as the vascularity index (VI). Our aim was to examine how parameters such as the intensity threshold affect the VI in in vivo xenograft models. Breast MDA-MB-231 tumors in the hind leg of SCID mice were treated with 0 or 8 Gy radiation, and imaged before and 24 h after treatment. A Vevo770 was used along with a 25-MHz center frequency transducer to obtain 3-D power Doppler images of tumors. Mice were again imaged while in the same position 1 min after sacrifice at 24 h. This was carried out for direct comparison of true blood flow signal to system noise level. The VI was computed for a range of intensity thresholds. The VI-threshold curves varied differently as a function of treatment, and preliminary data indicate an optimal plateau where the intensity threshold should be set, yielding a nearly true blood flow signal and minimizing noise signal. [Work funded by the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation.]