Correlation of Rupture Dynamics to the Nonlinear Backscatter Response From Polymer-Shelled Ultrasound Contrast Agents
Abstract
Polymer-shelled ultrasound contrast agents (UCAs) may expel their encapsulated gas subject to ultrasound- induced shell buckling or rupture. Nonlinear oscillations of this gas bubble can produce a subharmonic component in the ultrasound backscatter. This study investigated the relationship between this gas-release mechanism and shell-thickness- to-radius ratios (STRRs) of polymer-shelled UCAs. Three types of polylactide-shelled UCAs with STRRs of 7.5, 40, and 100 nm/μm were studied. Each UCA population had a nominal mean diameter of 2 μm. UCAs were subjected to increasing static overpressure ranging from 2 to 330 kPa over a duration of 2 h in a custom-designed test chamber while being imaged using a 200× magnification video microscope at a frame rate of 5 frames/s. Digitized video images were binarized and processed to obtain the cross-sectional area of individual UCAs. Integration of the normalized cross-sectional area over normalized time, defined as buckling factor (Bf), provided a dimensionless parameter for quantifying and comparing the degree of pre-rupture buckling exhibited by the UCAs of different STRRs in response to overpressure. The UCAs with an STRR of 7.5 nm/μm exhibited a distinct shell-buckling phase before shell rupture (Bf <; 1), whereas the UCAs with higher STRRs (40 and 100 nm/μm) did not undergo significant prerupture buckling (Bf ≈ 1). The difference in the overpressure response was correlated with the subharmonic response produced by these UCAs. When…
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