Brain microvascularization

3D Transcranial Ultrasound Localization Microscopy in the Rat Brain with a Multiplexed Matrix Probe

3D Transcranial Ultrasound Localization Microscopy in the Rat Brain with a Multiplexed Matrix Probe IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering (TBME)
Ultrasound Localization Microscopy (ULM) provides high-resolution imaging of the microcirculation in-depth in living tissue. Micrometric bubbles are injected into the bloodstream and localized individually to reconstruct the vascularization of an organ. This work presents an implementation of volumetric ULM with a multiplexed matrix probe driven by a single commercial ultrasound scanner. Multiple optimizations enabled acquiring up to 100,000 volumes at 250 Hz during 7 minutes for ULM imaging of the rat brain. After reconstruction, vessels are revealed down to 31 µm in diameter under the intact skull of the animal, with blood flows from 4.3 to 28.4 mm/s. read more