Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2019 Jun 3;10(7):3124-3138.
doi: 10.1364/BOE.10.003124. eCollection 2019 Jul 1.

Reducing artifacts in photoacoustic imaging by using multi-wavelength excitation and transducer displacement

Ho Nhu Y Nguyen  1 , Wiendelt Steenbergen  1
Affiliations

Reducing artifacts in photoacoustic imaging by using multi-wavelength excitation and transducer displacement

Ho Nhu Y Nguyen et al. Biomed Opt Express. .

Abstract

The occurrence of artifacts is a major challenge in photoacoustic imaging. The artifacts negatively affect the quality and reliability of the images. An approach using multi-wavelength excitation has previously been reported for in-plane artifact identification. Yet, out-of-plane artifacts cannot be tackled with this method. Here we propose a new method using ultrasound transducer array displacement. By displacing the ultrasound transducer array axially, we can de-correlate out-of-plane artifacts with in-plane image features and thus remove them. Combining this new method with the previous one allows us to remove potentially completely both in-plane and out-of-plane artifacts in photoacoustic imaging. We experimentally demonstrate this with experiments in phantoms as well as in vivo.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that there are no conflicts of interest related to this article.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Artifacts in PAI. (a) Configuration resulting in artifacts. (b) Acquired PA image.
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Displacing the transducer array. (a) Initial, and (b) displaced configuration. (c) Acquired PA image of configuration (a). (d) Acquired PA image of configuration (b).
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
In-plane and out-of-plane features behavior, (b) and (c) on the dotted and dashed lines respectively in (a), as an effect of the transducer array displacement. (d) OPA correcting along the displacement.
Fig. 4
Fig. 4
Dependence of ΔzT on the 3 parameters zo, a, and xo.
Fig. 5
Fig. 5
Flow chart of the transducer array displacement method.
Fig. 6
Fig. 6
Schematic drawing of the setup with the probe movable in the vertical position and the optical fiber in a fixed position.
Fig. 7
Fig. 7
phantom 1. (a) Two absorbers embedded in agarose in a petri dish lid. (b) Schematic elevation view of the experiment configuration. (c) Combined PA and US image.
Fig. 8
Fig. 8
Correcting IPAs. (a) Acquired PA image. (b) IPA corrected image.
Fig. 9
Fig. 9
In-plane and out-of-plane features behavior, (b) and (c) on the dotted and dashed lines respectively in (a), as an effect of the transducer array displacement.
Fig. 10
Fig. 10
Correcting OPAs. (a) Acquired PA image. (b) OPA corrected image.
Fig. 11
Fig. 11
Final corrected image.
Fig. 12
Fig. 12
Phantom 2. (a) Two black absorbers embedded in agarose in a petri dish. (b) Schematic elevation view of the experiment configuration. (c) Acquired images along the displacement.
Fig. 13
Fig. 13
OPA corrected image. (a) Acquired and OPA corrected images. (b) and (c) Behavior of features in dashed and dotted lines in (a) respectively.
Fig. 14
Fig. 14
In vivo experiment. (a) Experiment configuration. (b) Ink mark mimicking a human spot. (c) Acquired PA image. (d) Acquired US image.
Fig. 15
Fig. 15
IPA and OPA corrected images.
Fig. 16
Fig. 16
Final corrected image.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Valluru K. S., Wilson K. E., Willmann J. K., “Photoacoustic Imaging in oncology: translational preclinical and early clinical experience,” Radiology 280(2), 332–349 (2016).10.1148/radiol.16151414 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Heijblom M., Piras D., van den Engh F. M., van der Schaaf M., Klaase J. M., Steenbergen W., Manohar S., “The state of the art in breast imaging using the Twente Photoacoustic Mammoscope: results from 31 measurements on malignancies,” Eur. Radiol. 26(11), 3874–3887 (2016).10.1007/s00330-016-4240-7 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Heijblom M., Steenbergen W., Manohar S., “Clinical photoacoustic breast imaging: the Twente experience,” IEEE Pulse 6(3), 42–46 (2015).10.1109/MPUL.2015.2409102 - DOI - PubMed
    1. van den Berg P. J., Daoudi K., Bernelot Moens H. J., Steenbergen W., “Feasibility of photoacoustic/ultrasound imaging of synovitis in finger joints using a point-of-care system,” Photoacoustics 8, 8–14 (2017).10.1016/j.pacs.2017.08.002 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Toi M., Asao Y., Matsumoto Y., Sekiguchi H., Yoshikawa A., Takada M., Kataoka M., Endo T., Kawaguchi-Sakita N., Kawashima M., Fakhrejahani E., Kanao S., Yamaga I., Nakayama Y., Tokiwa M., Torii M., Yagi T., Sakurai T., Togashi K., Shiina T., “Visualization of tumor-related blood vessels in human breast by photoacoustic imaging system with a hemispherical detector array,” Sci. Rep. 7(1), 41970 (2017).10.1038/srep41970 - DOI - PMC - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources