Structural and elastic determinants of axial transmission ultrasonic velocity in the human radius

Abstract

Accurate clinical interpretation of the sound velocity derived from axial transmission devices requires a detailed understanding of the propa-gation phenomena involved and of the bone factors that have an impact on measurements. In the low-megahertz range, ultrasonic propagation in cortical bone depends on anisotropic elastic tissue properties, porosity, and the spatial dimensions, e.g., cortical thickness. A subset of ten human radius samples from a previous biaxial transmission investigation was inspected using 50-MHz scanning acoustic microscopy (SAM) and synchrotron radiation computed tomography (SR-CT). Low-frequency axial transmission sound speed at 1 and 2 MHz was related to structural properties (cortical thickness C.Th, porosity POR, Haversian cavity density CDH) and tissue parameters (acoustic impedance Z, mineral density MD) on site-matched cross sections. Significant linear multivariate regression models (1 MHz: R=0.84, p<1E−4, 2 MHz: R=0.65, p<1E−4) were found for the combination of C.Th with POR and Z (measured in the external cortical quarter). A modified model accounting for the nonlinear dispersion relation with C.Th was also highly significant (R=0.75, p<1E−4, rmse=49.22 m/s) and explained (after adjustment for dispersion) 55.6% of the variance of the sound velocity by variations of porosity (15.6%) and impedance (40%).