Quantifying Speed of Sound in Tissue for Medical Ultrasound

Stanford researchers developed an ultrasound method to estimate the local speed of sound of tissue, regardless of the tissue overlying the target location. The method uses existing pulse-echo transducer arrays and ultrasound hardware, and does not require any specialized equipment. It is also more accurate than existing estimators. Since the method provides a quantitative measure of speed of sound - a parameter that is often related to disease state - it may aid the diagnosing and assessing of non alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), cancer, tumors, and inflammation.

Stage of Research
Researchers have demonstrated the method reduces bias and variance compared to existing speed of sound estimation methods and systems.