Vendredi 1er octobre 2010 à 11 h 00 – À l’invitation de Chantal Pichon

« Ultrasound contrast agents and sonoporation »

Professeur Michiel Postema

Institute for Medical Engineering
Ruhr-Universität Bochum
Bochum, Germany

Ultrasonic imaging is becoming the most popular medical imaging modality, owing to the low price per examination and its safety. However, blood is a poor scatterer of ultrasound waves at clinical diagnostic transmit frequencies. For perfusion imaging, markers have been designed to enhance the contrast in B-mode imaging. These so-called ultrasound contrast agents consist of microscopically small gas bubbles encapsulated in biodegradable shells.
In this seminar, the physical principles of ultrasound contrast agent microbubble behaviour and their adjustment for drug delivery including sonoporation are described. Furthermore, an outline of clinical imaging applications of contrast-enhanced ultrasound is given