3-D Stochastic Numerical Breast Phantoms for Enabling Virtual Imaging Trials of Ultrasound Computed Tomography

Ultrasound computed tomography (USCT) is an emerging imaging modality for breast imaging that can produce quantitative images that depict the acoustic properties of tissues. Computer-simulation studies, also known as virtual imaging trials, provide researchers with an economical and convenient route to systematically explore imaging system designs and image reconstruction methods. When simulating an imaging technology intended for clinical use, it is essential to employ realistic numerical phantoms that can facilitate the objective, or task-based, assessment of image quality (IQ). Moreover, when computing objective IQ measures, an ensemble of such phantoms should be employed, which displays the variability in anatomy and object properties that are representative of the to-be-imaged patient cohort. Such stochastic phantoms for clinically relevant applications of USCT are currently lacking. In this work, a methodology for producing realistic 3-D numerical breast phantoms for enabling clinically relevant computer-simulation studies of USCT breast imaging is presented. By extending and adapting an existing stochastic 3-D breast phantom for use with USCT, methods for creating ensembles of numerical acoustic breast phantoms are established. These breast phantoms will possess clinically relevant variations in breast size, composition, acoustic properties, tumor locations, and tissue textures. To demonstrate the use of the phantoms in virtual USCT studies, two brief case studies are presented, which addresses the development and assessment of image reconstruction procedures. Examples of breast phantoms produced by use of the proposed methods and a collection of 52 sets of simulated USCT measurement data have been made open source for use in image reconstruction development.

Multimodal Breast Phantoms for Microwave, Ultrasound, Mammography, Magnetic Resonance and Computed Tomography Imaging

The aim of this work was to develop multimodal anthropomorphic breast phantoms suitable for evaluating the imaging performance of a recently-introduced Microwave Imaging (MWI) technique in comparison to the established diagnostic imaging modalities of Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), Ultrasound (US), mammography and Computed Tomography (CT). MWI is an emerging technique with significant potential to supplement established imaging techniques to improve diagnostic confidence for breast cancer detection. To date, numerical simulations have been used to assess the different MWI scanning and image reconstruction algorithms in current use, while only a few clinical trials have been conducted. To bridge the gap between the numerical simulation environment and a more realistic diagnostic scenario, anthropomorphic phantoms which mimic breast tissues in terms of their heterogeneity, anatomy, morphology, and mechanical and dielectric characteristics, may be used. Key in this regard is achieving realism in the imaging appearance of the different healthy and pathologic tissue types for each of the modalities, taking into consideration the differing imaging and contrast mechanisms for each modality. Suitable phantoms can thus be used by radiologists to correlate image findings between the emerging MWI technique and the more familiar images generated by the conventional modalities. Two phantoms were developed in this study, representing difficult-to-image and easy-to-image patients: the former contained a complex boundary between the mammary fat and fibroglandular tissues, extracted from real patient MRI datasets, while the latter contained a simpler and less morphologically accurate interface. Both phantoms were otherwise identical, with tissue-mimicking materials (TMMs) developed to mimic skin, subcutaneous fat, fibroglandular tissue, tumor and pectoral muscle. The phantoms’ construction used non-toxic materials, and they were inexpensive and relatively easy to manufacture. Both phantoms were scanned using conventional modalities (MRI, US, mammography and CT) and a recently introduced MWI radar detection procedure called in-coherent Multiple Signal Classification (I-MUSIC). Clinically realistic artifact-free images of the anthropomorphic breast phantoms were obtained using the conventional imaging techniques as well as the emerging technique of MWI.

Breast Cancer Assessment With Pulse-Echo Speed of Sound Ultrasound From Intrinsic Tissue Reflections: Proof-of-Concept

PURPOSE

The aim of this study was to differentiate malignant and benign solid breast lesions with a novel ultrasound (US) technique, which measures speed of sound (SoS) using standard US transducers and intrinsic tissue reflections and scattering (speckles) as internal reference.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

This prospective, institutional review board-approved, Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act-compliant prospective comparison study was performed with prior written informed consent from 20 women. Ten women with histological proven breast cancer and 10 with fibroadenoma were measured. A conventional US system with a linear probe was used for SoS-US (SonixTouch; Ultrasonix, Richmond, British Columbia, Canada). Tissue speckle reflections served as a timing reference for the US signals transmitted through the breasts. Relative phase inconsistencies were detected using plane wave measurements from different angular directions, and SoS images with 0.5-mm resolution were generated using a spatial domain reconstruction algorithm. The SoS of tumors were compared with the breast density of a larger cohort of 106 healthy women.

RESULTS

Breast lesions show focal increments ΔSoS (meters per second) with respect to the tissue background. Peak ΔSoS values were evaluated. Breast carcinoma showed significantly higher ΔSoS than fibroadenomas ([INCREMENT]SoS > 41.64 m/s: sensitivity, 90%; specificity, 80%; area under curve, 0.910) and healthy breast tissue of different densities (area under curve, 0.938; sensitivity, 90%; specificity, 96.5%). The lesion localization in SoS-US images was consistent with B-mode imaging and repeated SoS-US measurements were reproducible.

CONCLUSIONS

Using SoS-US, based on conventional US and tissue speckles as timing reference, breast carcinoma showed significantly higher SoS values than fibroadenoma and healthy breast tissue of different densities. The SoS presents a promising technique for differentiating solid breast lesions.

Time domain reconstruction of sound speed and attenuation in ultrasound computed tomography using full wave inversion

Ultrasound computed tomography (USCT) is a non-invasive imaging technique that provides information about the acoustic properties of soft tissues in the body, such as the speed of sound (SS) and acoustic attenuation (AA). Knowledge of these properties can improve the discrimination between benign and malignant masses, especially in breast cancer studies. Full wave inversion (FWI) methods for image reconstruction in USCT provide the best image quality compared to more approximate methods. Using FWI, the SS is usually recovered in the time domain, and the AA is usually recovered in the frequency domain. Nevertheless, as both properties can be obtained from the same data, it is desirable to have a common framework to reconstruct both distributions. In this work, an algorithm is proposed to reconstruct both the SS and AA distributions using a time domain FWI methodology based on the fractional Laplacian wave equation, an adjoint field formulation, and a gradient-descent method. The optimization code employs a Compute Unified Device Architecture version of the software k-Wave, which provides high computational efficiency. The performance of the method was evaluated using simulated noisy data from numerical breast phantoms. Errors were less than 0.5% in the recovered SS and 10% in the AA.

Eliminating incident subtraction in diffraction tomography

Diffraction tomography is a powerful algorithm for producing high-resolution quantitative reconstructions across a wide range of applications. A major drawback of the method is that it operates on the scattered field, which cannot generally be directly measured, but must instead be calculated by subtracting the incident field, i.e. the equivalent field with no scatterer present. Unfortunately, often the incident field is not measurable and hence must be estimated, causing errors. This paper highlights an important, but not widely recognized, result: for particular widely used formulations of the algorithm, the subtraction of the incident field is unnecessary, and the algorithm can actually be applied directly to measured signals. The theory behind this is derived, showing that the incident field will vanish under far-field conditions, and the result is demonstrated in practice. Tests with subsampled arrays show that aliasing artefacts can appear, but can be removed with a filter at the expense of resolution. The incident field also has no effect for a variety of array configurations tested. Finally, the performance in the presence of both correlated and uncorrelated errors is confirmed, in all cases demonstrating that the incident field has a negligible effect on the final reconstruction.

A two-dimensional analysis of the sensitivity of a pulse first break to wave speed contrast on a scale below the resolution length of ray tomography

Mapping the speed of mechanical waves traveling inside a medium is a topic of great interest across many fields from geoscience to medical diagnostics. Much work has been done to characterize the fidelity with which the geometrical features of the medium can be reconstructed and multiple resolution criteria have been proposed depending on the wave-matter interaction model used to decode the wave speed map from scattering measurements. However, these criteria do not define the accuracy with which the wave speed values can be reconstructed. Using two-dimensional simulations, it is shown that the first-arrival traveltime predicted by ray theory can be an accurate representation of the arrival of a pulse first break even in the presence of diffraction and other phenomena that are not accounted for by ray theory. As a result, ray-based tomographic inversions can yield accurate wave speed estimations also when the size of a sound speed anomaly is smaller than the resolution length of the inversion method provided that traveltimes are estimated from the signal first break. This increased sensitivity however renders the inversion more susceptible to noise since the amplitude of the signal around the first break is typically low especially when three-dimensional anomalies are considered.

Guided Wave Tomography Based on Full-Waveform Inversion

In this paper, a guided wave tomography method based on Full Waveform Inversion (FWI) is developed for accurate and high resolu- tion reconstruction of the remaining wall thickness in isotropic plates. The forward model is computed in the frequency domain by solving a full-wave equation in a two-dimensional acoustic model, accounting for higher order eects such as diractions and multiple scattering. Both numerical simulations and experiments were carried out to obtain the signals of a dispersive guided mode propagating through defects. The inversion was based on local optimization of a waveform mist func- tion between modeled and measured data, and was applied iteratively to discrete frequency components from low to high frequencies. The resulting wave velocity maps were then converted to thickness maps by the dispersion characteristics of selected guided modes. The results suggest that the FWI method is capable to reconstruct the thickness map of a irregularly shaped defect accurately on a 10 mm thick plate with the thickness error within 0.5 mm.

Image fusion of Ultrasound Computer Tomography volumes with X-ray mammograms using a biomechanical model based 2D/3D registration

Ultrasound Computer Tomography (USCT) is a promising breast imaging modality under development. Comparison to a standard method like mammography is essential for further development. Due to significant differences in image dimensionality and compression state of the breast, correlating USCT images and X-ray mammograms is challenging. In this paper we present a 2D/3D registration method to improve the spatial correspondence and allow direct comparison of the images. It is based on biomechanical modeling of the breast and simulation of the mammographic compression. We investigate the effect of including patient-specific material parameters estimated automatically from USCT images. The method was systematically evaluated using numerical phantoms and in-vivo data. The average registration accuracy using the automated registration was 11.9mm. Based on the registered images a method for analysis of the diagnostic value of the USCT images was developed and initially applied to analyze sound speed and attenuation images based on X-ray mammograms as ground truth. Combining sound speed and attenuation allows differentiating lesions from surrounding tissue. Overlaying this information on mammograms, combines quantitative and morphological information for multimodal diagnosis.

An ultrasound tomography system with polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) moldings for coupling: in vivo results for 3-D pulse-echo imaging of the female breast

Full-angle spatial compounding (FASC) is a concept for pulse-echo imaging using an ultrasound tomography (UST) system. With FASC, resolution is increased and speckles are suppressed by averaging pulse-echo data from 360°. In vivo investigations have already shown a great potential for 2-D FASC in the female breast as well as for finger-joint imaging. However, providing a small number of images of parallel cross-sectional planes with enhanced image quality is not sufficient for diagnosis. Therefore, volume data (3-D) is needed. For this purpose, we further developed our UST add-on system to automatically rotate a motorized array (3-D probe) around the object of investigation. Full integration of external motor and ultrasound electronics control in a custom-made program allows acquisition of 3-D pulse-echo RF datasets within 10 min. In case of breast cancer imaging, this concept also enables imaging of near-thorax tissue regions which cannot be achieved by 2-D FASC. Furthermore, moldings made of polyvinyl alcohol hydrogel (PVA-H) have been developed as a new acoustic coupling concept. It has a great potential to replace the water bath technique in UST, which is a critical concept with respect to clinical investigations. In this contribution, we present in vivo results for 3-D FASC applied to imaging a female breast which has been placed in a PVA-H molding during data acquisition. An algorithm is described to compensate time-of-flight and consider refraction at the water-PVA-H molding and molding-tissue interfaces. Therefore, the mean speed of sound (SOS) for the breast tissue is estimated with an image-based method. Our results show that the PVA-H molding concept is applicable and feasible and delivers good results. 3-D FASC is superior to 2-D FASC and provides 3-D volume data at increased image quality.

Combining time of flight and diffraction tomography for high resolution breast imaging: initial in vivo results (L)

Ultrasound tomography (UST) is being developed to address the limitations of mammography in breast cancer detection. Central to the success of UST is the possibility of obtaining high-resolution images of tissue mechanical properties across the whole breast. A recent paper [Huthwaite and Simonetti, J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 130, 1721-1734 (2011)] made use of a numerical phantom to demonstrate that sufficient image resolution can be obtained by simply treating refraction and diffraction effects in consecutive steps through the combination of ray-based time of flight and diffraction tomography. This letter presents the first experimental demonstration of the method using phantom and invivo data from a cancer patient.

Conformal ultrasound imaging system for anatomical breast inspection

Ultrasound tomography has considerable potential as a means of breast cancer detection because it reduces the operator-dependency observed in echography. A half-ring transducer array was designed based on breast anatomy, to obtain reflectivity images of the ductolobular structures using tomographic reconstruction procedures. The 3-MHz transducer array comprises 1024 elements set in a 190-degree circular arc with a radius of 100 mm. The front-end electronics incorporate 32 independent parallel transmit/receive channels and a 32-to-1024 multiplexer unit. The transmit and receive circuitries have a variable sampling frequency of up to 80 MHz and 12-bit precision. Arbitrary waveforms are synthesized to improve the signal-to-noise ratio and to increase the spatial resolution when working with low-contrast objects. The setup was calibrated with academic objects and a needle hydrophone to develop the data correction tools and specify the properties of the system. The backscattering field was recorded using a restricted aperture, and tomographic acquisitions were performed with a pair of 0.08-mm-diameter steel wires, a low-contrast 2-D breast phantom, and a breast-shaped phantom containing inclusions. Data were processed with dedicated correction tools and a pulse compression technique. Objects were reconstructed using the elliptical back-projection algorithm.

Non-linear inverse scattering: high resolution quantitative breast tissue tomography

Recent published results in inverse scattering generally show the difficulty in dealing with moderate to high contrast inhomogeneities when employing linearized or iteratively linearized algorithms (e.g., distorted Born iterative method). This paper presents a fully nonlinear algorithm utilizing full wave field data, that results in ultrasound computed tomographic images from a laboratory breast scanner, and shows several such unique images from volunteer subjects. The forward problem, data collection process and inverse scattering algorithm used are discussed. A functional that represents the "best fit" between predicted and measured data is minimized, and therefore requires a very fast forward problem solver, Jacobian calculation, and gradient estimation, all of which are described. The data collection device is described. The algorithm and device yield quantitative estimates of human breast tissue in vivo. Several high resolution images, measuring ∼150 by 150 wavelengths, obtained from the 2D inverse scattering algorithms, using data collected from a first prototype, are shown and discussed. The quantitative values are compared with previous published work.

High-resolution imaging without iteration: a fast and robust method for breast ultrasound tomography

Breast ultrasound tomography has the potential to improve the cost, safety, and reliability of breast cancer screening and diagnosis over the gold-standard of mammography. Vital to achieving this potential is the development of imaging algorithms to unravel the complex anatomy of the breast and its mechanical properties. The solution most commonly relied upon is time-of-flight tomography, but this exhibits low resolution due to the presence of diffraction effects. Iterative full-wave inversion methods present one solution to achieve higher resolution, but these are slow and are not guaranteed to converge to the correct solution. Presented here is HARBUT, the hybrid algorithm for robust breast ultrasound tomography, which utilizes the complementary strengths of time-of-flight and diffraction tomography resulting in a direct, fast, robust and accurate high resolution method of reconstructing the sound speed through the breast. The algorithm is shown to produce accurate reconstructions with realistic data from a complex three-dimensional simulation, with masses as small as 4 mm being clearly visible.

Guided wave diffraction tomography within the born approximation

Detection and sizing of corrosion in pipelines and pressure vessels over large, partially accessible areas is of growing interest in the petrochemical industry. Low-frequency guided wave diffraction tomography is a potentially attractive technique to rapidly evaluate the thickness of large sections of partially accessible structures. Finite element simulations of a 64-element circular array on a plate show that when the scattering mechanism of the object to be reconstructed satisfies the Born approximation, the reconstruction of the thickness is accurate. However, the practical implementation is more challenging because the incident field is not known. This paper describes the baseline subtraction approach commonly used in structural health monitoring applications and proposes a new approach in which the measurement of the incident field is not required when using a circular array of transducers. Experimental results demonstrate that ultimately the scattering from the array of transducers is a major source of error in the tomographic reconstruction, but when there is no scattering from the array of transducers the reconstructions are very similar to the finite element simulations.