Ultrasound in Medicine and Biology最新文献

{"title":"Possible Association of Nrf2/ARE and NFκB Response to Osteoblast Function in Spheroid Culture Induced by Low-Intensity Pulsed Ultrasound (LIPUS).","authors":"Yusuke Kubo, Anna Theresa Tangarife Bodensiek, Sebastian Lippross, Marek Weiler, Nina Reinhardt, Matias de la Fuente Klein, Matthias Gatz, Ulf Krister Hofmann, Fabian Kießling, Vera Jankowski, Jaana-Sophia Kern, Marta Rizk, Elizabeth Rosado Balmayor, Anna Bock, Michael Wolf, Thomas Pufe, Mersedeh Tohidnezhad","doi":"10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2025.03.013","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2025.03.013","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Objective: </strong>NFκB negatively affects bone metabolism through inflammatory pathways, whereas Nrf2 benefits it by regulating antioxidant/detoxifying enzymes through antioxidant response element (ARE) activity. We investigated whether low-intensity pulsed ultrasound (LIPUS) enhances osteogenic differentiation in 3D culture and whether it affects osteoblastic differentiation-associated markers such as calcium and alkaline phosphatase (ALP), and the regulation of NFκB and/or ARE.</p><p><strong>Methods: </strong>Murine MC3T3-E1 preosteoblasts were used to produce 3D-spheroids, which were treated with LIPUS. Time-dependent morphological change of spheroids was evaluated by microscopy, histology, and micro-CT. To analyze changes in ARE levels, a combination of LIPUS with an optimal concentration and timing of the Nrf2-inducer sulforaphane was applied. Osteoblast differentiation and mineralization were achieved through stimulation with differentiation medium for 21-28 days, during which LIPUS was used every day at 24-hour intervals. Differentiation was evaluated using calcium and ALP assay. Finally, cells were transduced with SIN-lenti-NFκB/SIN-lenti-ARE construct, and the effects of single-shot LIPUS on NFκB and ARE were evaluated using Nano-Glo® Luciferase Assay.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>Morphologically, in LIPUS group, shrinkage behaviour, which may correlate with cell differentiation, was observed to be more pronounced. NFκB activity with LIPUS was significantly lower than without treatment, whereas ARE activity showed significant increase only immediately after LIPUS treatment. Conversely, LIPUS enhanced ARE activity in combination with sulforaphane administration. After 28 days, the calcium content and ALP activity of LIPUS-treated spheroids increased significantly.</p><p><strong>Conclusion: </strong>This study suggests that LIPUS may have NFκB-downregulating, limited ARE-raising effects in combination with sulforaphane, and elevating osteoblast mineralization three-dimensionally. Thus, LIPUS could be useful for treating fractures in conditions of oxidative stress and hyper-inflammation.</p>","PeriodicalId":49399,"journal":{"name":"Ultrasound in Medicine and Biology","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2025-04-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144037727","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"EfficientNet-Based Attention Residual U-Net With Guided Loss for Breast Tumor Segmentation in Ultrasound Images","authors":"Heena Jasrotia,&nbsp;Chandan Singh,&nbsp;Sukhjeet Kaur","doi":"10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2025.03.009","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2025.03.009","url":null,"abstract":"<div><h3>Objective</h3><div>Breast cancer poses a major health concern for women globally. Effective segmentation of breast tumors for ultrasound images is crucial for early diagnosis and treatment. Conventional convolutional neural networks have shown promising results in this domain but face challenges due to image complexities and are computationally expensive, limiting their practical application in real-time clinical settings.</div></div><div><h3>Methods</h3><div>We propose Eff-AResUNet-GL, a segmentation model using EfficienetNet-B3 as the encoder. This design integrates attention gates in skip connections to focus on significant features and residual blocks in the decoder to retain details and reduce gradient loss. Additionally, guided loss functions are applied at each decoder layer to generate better features, subsequently improving segmentation accuracy.</div></div><div><h3>Results</h3><div>Experimental results on BUSIS and Dataset B demonstrate that Eff-AResUNet-GL achieves superior performance and computational efficiency compared to state-of-the-art models, showing robustness in handling complex breast ultrasound images.</div></div><div><h3>Conclusion</h3><div>Eff-AResUNet-GL offers a practical, high-performing solution for breast tumor segmentation, demonstrating potential clinical through improved segmentation accuracy and efficiency.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":49399,"journal":{"name":"Ultrasound in Medicine and Biology","volume":"51 7","pages":"Pages 1112-1123"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2025-04-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144042070","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Effect of Smoothing and Drift Compensation on Fetal Strain","authors":"Umael Khan ,&nbsp;Tom Roar Omdal ,&nbsp;Cathrine Ebbing ,&nbsp;Jörg Kessler ,&nbsp;Elisabeth Leirgul ,&nbsp;Gottfried Greve","doi":"10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2025.03.014","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2025.03.014","url":null,"abstract":"<div><h3>Objective</h3><div>The aim of this study was to assess the effect of user-regulated image-processing settings (spatial smoothing, temporal smoothing and drift compensation) on fetal left ventricular strain.</div></div><div><h3>Methods</h3><div>Left ventricular average longitudinal strain was acquired from the four-chamber view of the fetal heart from 34 fetuses, with 30 fetuses presenting adequate quality. A total of 18 different settings for spatial smoothing, temporal smoothing and drift compensation were examined. At each setting the average strain for the 30 fetuses was calculated, whereby one could examine whether there was an average difference in fetal strain at the different settings. Furthermore, the difference between the highest and lowest strain values across the 18 settings was assessed for each fetus (min-max difference). The average min-max difference was then calculated across the 30 fetuses to calculate the mean discrepancy in fetal strain due to smoothing settings.</div></div><div><h3>Results</h3><div>The average effect of the smoothing settings as well as drift compensation by them was small. However, when examining the discrepancy induced by the different settings together, they induced average proportional differences of approximately 18% for the endocardial and epicardial layers and 15% for the mid-wall layer.</div></div><div><h3>Conclusion</h3><div>This study shows that while the average effect of different smoothing settings and drift compensation was small, they induced significant discrepancy in strain values on the individual level. We recommend that examiners be consistent with regard to smoothing and drift compensation settings.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":49399,"journal":{"name":"Ultrasound in Medicine and Biology","volume":"51 7","pages":"Pages 1148-1152"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2025-04-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144036388","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Development and Validation an AI Model to Improve the Diagnosis of Deep Infiltrating Endometriosis for Junior Sonologists","authors":"Jing Xu ,&nbsp;Aohua Zhang ,&nbsp;Zhijuan Zheng,&nbsp;Junyan Cao,&nbsp;Xinling Zhang","doi":"10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2025.03.012","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2025.03.012","url":null,"abstract":"<div><h3>Objective</h3><div>This study aims to develop and validate an artificial intelligence (AI) model based on ultrasound (US) videos and images to improve the performance of junior sonologists in detecting deep infiltrating endometriosis (DE).</div></div><div><h3>Methods</h3><div>In this retrospective study, data were collected from female patients who underwent US examinations and had DE. The US image records were divided into two parts. First, during the model development phase, an AI-DE model was trained employing YOLOv8 to detect pelvic DE nodules. Subsequently, its clinical applicability was evaluated by comparing the diagnostic performance of junior sonologists with and without AI-model assistance.</div></div><div><h3>Results</h3><div>The AI-DE model was trained using 248 images, which demonstrated high performance, with a mAP50 (mean Average Precision at IoU threshold 0.5) of 0.9779 on the test set. Total 147 images were used for evaluate the diagnostic performance. The diagnostic performance of junior sonologists improved with the assistance of the AI-DE model. The area under the receiver operating characteristic (AUROC) curve improved from 0.748 (95% CI, 0.624–0.867) to 0.878 (95% CI, 0.792–0.964; <em>p</em> &lt; 0.0001) for junior sonologist A, and from 0.713 (95% CI, 0.592–0.835) to 0.798 (95% CI, 0.677–0.919; <em>p</em> &lt; 0.0001) for junior sonologist B. Notably, the sensitivity of both sonologists increased significantly, with the largest increase from 77.42% to 94.35%.</div></div><div><h3>Conclusion</h3><div>The AI-DE model based on US images showed good performance in DE detection and significantly improved the diagnostic performance of junior sonologists.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":49399,"journal":{"name":"Ultrasound in Medicine and Biology","volume":"51 7","pages":"Pages 1143-1147"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2025-04-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144041843","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Reliability of Ultrasound and Shear Wave Elastography in Assessing Lower Extremity Nerve Stiffness and Excursion: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis","authors":"Olga Sánchez-Ramírez ,&nbsp;Jaime Almazán-Polo ,&nbsp;Ángel González-de-la-Flor","doi":"10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2025.03.006","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2025.03.006","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This study aimed to evaluate the reliability and methodological quality of ultrasonography and ultrasound elastography in assessing neural excursion and stiffness through shear wave elastography (SWE) of lower extremity nerves. Following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines, a systematic review was conducted across MEDLINE, Scopus, Web of Science, CINAHL, and SPORTDiscus databases, covering publications from 2014 to 2024. Out of 270 studies initially identified, 26 met the eligibility criteria, involving a total of 778 participants and 1,448 nerves. Reliability metrics included intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC), standard error of measurement (SEM), and minimal detectable change (MDC). Meta-analyses were performed for the sciatic and tibial nerves, incorporating data from studies employing SWE and B-mode ultrasonography. The pooled ICC for SWE in the sciatic nerve was 0.96 (95% CI: 0.93–0.98, I² = 25.6%), indicating excellent reliability. For the tibial nerve, ICCs varied by position, with an overall ICC of 0.87 (95% CI: 0.75–0.99, I² = 84.2%) for supine and prone positions and 0.96 (95% CI: 0.94–0.98, I² = 1.5%) for longitudinal excursion in weight-bearing and side-lying positions. Subgroup analyses revealed no significant differences between the two groups. This systematic review and meta-analysis support the reliability of SWE in assessing sciatic and tibial nerve stiffness, along with tibial nerve excursion in specific positions. However, these findings should be interpreted with caution, as evidence for the saphenous and femoral nerves remains limited.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":49399,"journal":{"name":"Ultrasound in Medicine and Biology","volume":"51 7","pages":"Pages 1043-1058"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2025-04-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144058517","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Editorial Advisory Board","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/S0301-5629(25)00098-5","DOIUrl":"10.1016/S0301-5629(25)00098-5","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":49399,"journal":{"name":"Ultrasound in Medicine and Biology","volume":"51 6","pages":"Page i"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2025-04-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143838711","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Homodyned K-Distribution Temporal-Based Characterization of Rat Placenta Microstructure Using the Reduced Uterine Perfusion Pressure Model of Preeclampsia","authors":"Alexander D. Gleed ,&nbsp;Andrew C. Markel ,&nbsp;Lili Shi ,&nbsp;Allan K.N. Alencar ,&nbsp;Kenneth F. Swan ,&nbsp;Cameron Hoerig ,&nbsp;Gabriella C. Pridjian ,&nbsp;Carolyn L. Bayer ,&nbsp;Jonathan Mamou","doi":"10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2025.03.007","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2025.03.007","url":null,"abstract":"<div><h3>Objective</h3><div>We characterize rat placenta microstructure in the context of the reduced uterine perfusion pressure (RUPP) model of preeclampsia using the homodyned K-distribution to parameterize envelope-detected signals of ultrasound radiofrequency echo frames obtained <em>in vivo</em>. Preeclampsia is a life-threatening pregnancy syndrome related to abnormal placental tissue microstructure which motivated the quantitative ultrasound-based tissue characterization approach used in this study.</div></div><div><h3>Methods</h3><div>Ultrasound radiofrequency echo frames against time (or videos) were obtained on 30 and 38 <em>in vivo</em> placentae at gestation day (GD) 14 and 18 respectively, using 9 Sprague-Dawley rats. Preeclampsia–like effects were induced by surgical modification (post GD 14) following the RUPP model, giving a total of 20 RUPP and 18 control placentae at GD 18. The homodyned K-distribution was fit to value distributions of envelope-detected signals of ultrasound radiofrequency echo frames against time, yielding temporal <em>α</em> (scatterer number per resolution cell) and <em>κ</em> (ratio of coherent to diffuse signal power) parameters used to characterize the placental tissue microstructure.</div></div><div><h3>Results</h3><div>Visualization of GD 18 α values as a color overlay on B-mode ultrasound video suggested higher values of control compared with RUPP. The mean kurtosis for RUPP was 4.07 ± 0.71 in comparison to 5.08 ± 1.28 for the control using placenta-level kurtosis values (<em>p</em> = 0.0044). There were no significant differences observed in GD 14 placentae, consistent with expectations. Further, we visualized and quantified temporal changes in GD 18 α values with frame-level statistics that support earlier findings.</div></div><div><h3>Conclusions</h3><div>This study quantitatively characterizes rat placenta microstructure using the homodyned K-distribution and temporal α and <em>κ</em> parameters.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":49399,"journal":{"name":"Ultrasound in Medicine and Biology","volume":"51 7","pages":"Pages 1090-1101"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2025-04-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144058718","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Ultrasound and Microbubble Mediated Delivery of Virus-Sensitizing Drugs Improves In Vitro Oncolytic Virotherapy Against Breast Cancer Cells","authors":"Kishan Shamjibhai Italiya ,&nbsp;Victor Mullins-Dansereau ,&nbsp;Karen Geoffroy ,&nbsp;Victoria Heather Gilchrist ,&nbsp;Tommy Alain ,&nbsp;Marie-Claude Bourgeois-Daigneault ,&nbsp;François Yu","doi":"10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2025.03.010","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2025.03.010","url":null,"abstract":"<div><h3>Objective</h3><div>Oncolytic virotherapy is an emerging form of cancer treatment that uses replication-competent viruses to kill cancer cells. However, as for other cancer therapies, oncolytic viruses are not effective against all cancers and there is a need to further improve treatment efficacy while maintaining low toxicity. Viral sensitizers are drugs that potentiate viral replication in tumor cells. While various studies have shown their synergy with oncolytic virotherapy, the risks associated with systemic toxicities that vary according to the drug used limit the clinical translation of the approach. In this study, we used an ultrasound and image-guided approach in which we loaded viral-sensitizing drugs onto microbubbles which are then cavitated by ultrasound to deliver the encapsulated drugs to tumor cells, which improves <em>in vitro</em> oncolytic virotherapy efficacy in the 4T1 breast cancer model.</div></div><div><h3>Methods</h3><div>In this study, we loaded two viral sensitizers, paclitaxel and volasertib, onto lipid microbubbles and comprehensively characterized their effect on the infection of 4T1 murine mammary carcinoma cells by oncolytic Vesicular stomatitis virus <em>in vitro</em>.</div></div><div><h3>Results</h3><div>We synthesized lipid microbubbles with high and moderate encapsulation efficiency for paclitaxel (83.7%) and volasertib (28.6%), respectively. Stability assessments demonstrated excellent retention in various conditions, highlighting their potential for <em>in vivo</em> use. <em>In vitro</em> studies confirmed their acoustic responsiveness essential for controlled drug release at targeted sites. Paclitaxel and volasertib release from viral sensitizer-loaded microbubbles following ultrasound-triggered cavitation significantly increased viral replication (57-fold, <em>p</em> &lt; 0.0001 and 27-fold, <em>p</em> &lt; 0.01, respectively), as well as tumor cell killing compared to virus-infected untreated cells.</div></div><div><h3>Conclusion</h3><div>Altogether, our data show that drug-loaded microbubble cavitation and free drugs both sensitize cancer cells to oncolytic viruses to equivalent levels. These findings provide a proof of concept for the use of ultrasound-guided microbubble drug delivery in combination with oncolytic virotherapy.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":49399,"journal":{"name":"Ultrasound in Medicine and Biology","volume":"51 7","pages":"Pages 1124-1133"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2025-04-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143990140","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Predicting Benign and Malignant Subpleural Pulmonary Lesions With a Nomogram Model Using Clinical and B-Mode Ultrasound Parameters","authors":"Lei Hao ,&nbsp;Lijing Zhu ,&nbsp;Bojuan Wang ,&nbsp;Jingzhu Xu ,&nbsp;Xin Zhao ,&nbsp;Jie Zhao ,&nbsp;Zezheng Chen ,&nbsp;Xinghua Wang","doi":"10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2025.03.011","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2025.03.011","url":null,"abstract":"<div><h3>Objective</h3><div>To develop and validate an individualized nomogram for distinguishing between benign and malignant subpleural pulmonary lesions (SPLs) using B-mode ultrasound imaging and clinical data.</div></div><div><h3>Methods</h3><div>A total of 425 patients with SPLs were enrolled and classified into two groups: 220 patients were diagnosed with malignant lesions, and 205 with benign lesions. Patients were randomly assigned to a development cohort (DC, <em>n</em> = 297) and a validation cohort (VC, <em>n</em> = 128) in a 7:3 ratio. Statistical analyses included rank-sum tests and chi-square tests. Boruta analysis was used to identify key features associated with malignant SPLs. The multivariable logistic regression model based on independent malignant SPL factors was developed and represented as a nomogram. The model's performance was assessed in terms of discrimination, calibration and clinical utility.</div></div><div><h3>Results</h3><div>Six variables were selected to construct the nomogram: age, pack-year of smoking, air bronchogram, the angle between the lesion border and the thoracic wall, posterior echo of the lesion and visceral pleural invasion. The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve for the model was 0.859 (95% CI: 0.816–0.901) in the DC and 0.862 (95% CI: 0.800–0.923) in the VC. Calibration curve analysis demonstrated that the nomogram closely aligned with the ideal curve, reflecting its good calibration. Furthermore, decision curve analysis, clinical impact curve (CIC) and net reduction curve (NRC) further confirmed the model's favorable clinical utility.</div></div><div><h3>Conclusion</h3><div>We have developed a nomogram that serves as an effective tool for assessing malignant SPLs. This model holds significant promise as a complementary diagnostic aid, particularly in primary healthcare settings and bedside examination.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":49399,"journal":{"name":"Ultrasound in Medicine and Biology","volume":"51 7","pages":"Pages 1134-1142"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2025-04-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144042073","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Advancements in Noncontrast Ultrasound Imaging for Low-Velocity Flow: A Technical Review and Clinical Applications in Vascular Medicine","authors":"Rayan Seddiki ,&nbsp;Tristan Mirault ,&nbsp;Jonas Sitruk ,&nbsp;Nassim Mohamedi ,&nbsp;Emmanuel Messas ,&nbsp;Mathieu Pernot ,&nbsp;Jérôme Baranger ,&nbsp;Guillaume Goudot","doi":"10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2025.03.001","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2025.03.001","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Visualizing the arterial tree using ultrasound, from the aorta to the small vessels, has significantly improved over time due to advances in ultrasound imaging technology. Initially limited to exploring the major vessels, ultrasound analysis has made considerable progress with enhanced image quality. While injecting microbubbles as a contrast agent partially addresses this limitation, its use is constrained by the need for intravenous injection, making the examination more complex and time-consuming. To address these drawbacks, new commercial modes have emerged, distinct from conventional color- and power-Doppler modes, offering the ability to analyze slow flows and, consequently, microvascularization. These dedicated imaging modes include B-flow^TM, E-flow^TM, Superb Microvascular Imaging (SMI^TM), Micro Flow Imaging (MFI^TM), MV-Flow^TM, Detective Flow Imaging (DFI^TM), Micro-V^TM, and Angio PLUS imaging^TM. Although these modes share similar objectives, they are based on different technologies, each with its own specific characteristics. The exact algorithms behind these modes vary and are proprietary but rely on a combination of approaches to reduce tissue clutter and electronic noise while improving sensitivity to slower-flow Doppler signals. This review aims to explain the technological basis of these \"microvascular flow imaging modes” (MVFI) currently clinically available in vascular imaging to the physician and sonographer specialized in vascular ultrasound, discussing their current limitations and potential applications in vascular medicine.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":49399,"journal":{"name":"Ultrasound in Medicine and Biology","volume":"51 7","pages":"Pages 1035-1042"},"PeriodicalIF":2.4,"publicationDate":"2025-04-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144043688","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}