Liquid or solid ultrasonically tissue-mimicking materials with very low scatter.

Abstract

A new tissue-mimicking material for ultrasound, using evaporated milk as the primary absorption component, is described. It has very low backscatter but still exhibits the 1540 m s-1 propagation speed and proportionality of attenuation coefficient and frequency over the diagnostic frequency range. The material can be produced in solid or liquid form with attenuation coefficient slopes spanning the range 0.1-0.7 dB cm-1 MHz-1. The liquid form is useful in phantoms where detailed beam patterns are to be determined, either involving translation of measurement devices in the liquid or phantoms with fibers present for causing the only detectable echoes. In the latter case, the liquid quality allows removal of liquid with one attenuation coefficient slope and replacement with another. The solid form may be more useful than the liquid for two reasons. First, many simulated lesions (including ones that produce essentially no internal echoes) can lie in the scan slice with positions extending over the entire image area without enhancement or shadowing effects being of concern. Second, the lack of significant backscatter from the material in the absence of added scatterers allows the backscatter coefficient to be varied over a considerable range. A critical result is that intrinsic material contrast between targets and surroundings can be accurately predicted in terms of the concentrations of added scatterers and, assuming all scatterers are of the same type, the contrast will be completely independent of frequency. Use of the fungicide thimerosal eliminates deterioration, and ultrasonic properties have been shown to be stable over 2.5 years.