A simulation study on the sensitivity of transcranial ray-tracing ultrasound modeling to skull properties.

In transcranial focused ultrasound therapies, such as treating essential tremor via thermal ablation in the thalamus, acoustic energy is focused through the skull using a phased-array transducer. Ray tracing is a computationally efficient method that can correct skull-induced phase aberrations via per-element phase delay calculations using patient-specific computed tomography (CT) data. However, recent studies show that variations in CT-derived Hounsfield unit may account for only 50% of the speed of sound variability in human skull specimens, potentially limiting clinical transcranial ultrasound applications. Therefore, understanding the sensitivity of treatment planning methods to material parameter variations is essential. The present work uses a ray-tracing simulation model to explore how imprecision in model inputs, arising from clinically significant uncertainties in skull properties or considerations of acoustic phenomena, affects acoustic focusing quality through the skull. We propose and validate new methods to optimize ray-tracing skull simulations for clinical treatment planning, relevant for predicting intracranial target's thermal rise, using experimental data from ex-vivo human skulls.

Transcranial ultrasound simulations: A review.

Transcranial ultrasound is more and more used for therapy and imaging of the brain. However, the skull is a highly attenuating and aberrating medium, with different structures and acoustic properties among samples and even within a sample. Thus, case-specific simulations are needed to perform transcranial focused ultrasound interventions safely. In this article, we provide a review of the different methods used to model the skull and to simulate ultrasound propagation through it.

A semi-numerical model for near-critical angle scattering.

Numerous phenomena in the fields of physics and mathematics as seemingly different as seismology, ultrasonics, crystallography, photonics, relativistic quantum mechanics, and analytical number theory are described by integrals with oscillating integrands that contain three coalescing criticalities, a branch point, stationary phase point, and pole as well as accumulation points at which the speed of integrand oscillation is infinite. Evaluating such integrals is a challenge addressed in this paper. A fast and efficient numerical scheme based on the regularized composite Simpson's rule is proposed, and its efficacy is demonstrated by revisiting the scattering of an elastic plane wave by a stress-free half-plane crack embedded in an isotropic and homogeneous solid. In this canonical problem, the head wave, edge diffracted wave, and reflected (or compensating) wave each can be viewed as a respective contribution of a branch point, stationary phase point, and pole. The proposed scheme allows for a description of the non-classical diffraction effects near the "critical" rays (rays that separate regions irradiated by the head waves from their respective shadow zones). The effects include the spikes present in diffraction coefficients at the critical angles in the far field as well as related interference ripples in the near field.

Modeling of ultrasonic fields radiated by contact transducer in a component of irregular surface.

The wedge of a contact transducer is imperfectly coupled to a component of irregular surface. A volume between the wedge and the component (filled by water or oil used as a coupling) is created that fundamentally modifies transducer radiation behavior. As a result, phenomena like beam spreading, skewing and splitting, generation of unwanted contributions that possibly lead to false alarms may occur. At first, the paper describes a model to account for the main effects observable in such a situation. The model is based on a matrix method which describes the behavior of transient elementary contributions as the variation of a pencil propagating into homogeneous regions (namely, the wedge, the coupling and the component) and through interfaces between them (refraction and reflection). The elementary contributions accounting for the finite size of the transducer are summed to predict transducer diffraction effects. In a second part, predicted fields are compared to measured results. The comparison concerns particle velocity fields measurements at the surface opposite to that (irregular) on which the transducer acts. The very good agreement obtained proves the validity of our approach.