Quantitative ultrasound in cancer imaging.

Overview

Ultrasound is a relatively inexpensive, portable, and versatile imaging modality that has a broad range of clinical uses. It incorporates many imaging modes, such as conventional gray-scale "B-mode" imaging to display echo amplitude in a scanned plane; M-mode imaging to track motion at a given fixed location over time; duplex, color, and power Doppler imaging to display motion in a scanned plane; harmonic imaging to display nonlinear responses to incident ultrasound; elastographic imaging to display relative tissue stiffness; and contrast-agent imaging with simple contrast agents to display blood-filled spaces or with targeted agents to display specific agent-binding tissue types. These imaging modes have been well described in the scientific, engineering, and clinical literature. A less well-known ultrasonic imaging technology is based on quantitative ultrasound (QUS), which analyzes the distribution of power as a function of frequency in the original received echo signals from tissue and exploits the resulting spectral parameters to characterize and distinguish among tissues. This article discusses the attributes of QUS-based methods for imaging cancers and providing improved means of detecting and assessing tumors. The discussion will include applications to imaging primary prostate cancer and metastatic cancer in lymph nodes to illustrate the methods.