MICROCALCIFICATIONS AS ELASTIC SCATTERERS UNDER ULTRASOUND

One of the fundamental limitations of medical ultrasound in the imagin g of the breast is the inability of current practice to reliably visua lize microcalcifications in the size range of clinical interest. Micro calcifications (MCs) are small crystals of calcium phosphates that for m in human tissue through a number of mechanisms. The size, morphology , and distribution of MCs are important indicators in the mammographic screening for and diagnosis of various carcinomas in the breast. We a re investigating the imaging of MCs under ultrasound in the interest o f extending the utility of medical ultrasound in the breast clinic. We present an analysis of the acoustic properties of MCs modeled as elas tic spheres based on the Faran model that considers the predicted comp lex spectra and spatial coherence of echoes from MCs. We have found th e predictions of the model to be similar to ultrasound echoes from sus pected MCs in vivo. We also present breast phase aberration estimates and spatial and frequency compounding results based on the echoes from these targets.