FEASIBILITY OF USING ULTRASOUND PHASED-ARRAYS FOR MRI MONITORED NONINVASIVE SURGERY

The purpose of this paper was to evaluate the in vivo feasibility of u sing phased arrays for MRI guided ultrasound surgery, Two different ar ray concepts were investigated: a spherically curved concentric ring a rray to move the focus along the central iuds and a spherically curved 16 square element array to make the focus larger. Rabbit thigh muscle s were exposed in vivo in a 1.5 T MRI scanner to evaluate the array pe rformance. The results showed that both of the arrays performed as exp ected, and the focus could be moved and enlarged, In addition, adequat e power could be delivered from the arrays to necrose in vivo muscle t issue in 10 s, This study was the first implementation of phased array s for MRI guided ultrasound surgery, The results demonstrate that phas ed arrays have significant potential for noninvasive tissue coagulatio n.