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Abstract:
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Cancer has been one of main causes of human deaths for many years . Early detection of cancer is essential to provide definitive treatment . Among many cancer treatment methods , nanoparticle -mediated photothermal therapy is considered as one of the promising cancer treatment methods because of its non -invasiveness and cancer -specific therapy . Ultrasound and photoacoustic imaging can be utilized for both cancer detection and photothermal therapy guidance . Ultrasound elasticity imaging can detect cancer using tissue elastic properties . Once cancer is diagnosed , spectroscopic photoacoustic imaging can be used to monitor nanoparticle delivery before photothermal therapy . When nanoparticles are well accumulated at the tumor , ultrasound and photoacoustic -based thermal imaging can be utilized for estimating temperature distribution during photothermal therapy to guide therapeutic procedure .
In this dissertation , ultrasound beamforming , elasticity imaging , and spectroscopic photoacoustic imaging methods were developed to improve cancer detection and therapy guidance . Firstly , a display pixel based synthetic aperture focusing method was developed to fundamentally improve ultrasound image qualities . Secondly , an autocorrelation based sub -pixel displacement estimation method was developed to enhance signal -to -noise ratio of elasticity images . The developed elasticity imaging method was utilized to clinically evaluate the feasibility of using ultrasound elasticity imaging for prostate cancer detection . Lastly , a minimum mean square error based spectral separation method was developed to robustly utilize spectroscopic photoacoustic imaging . The developed spectroscopic photoacoustic imaging method was utilized to demonstrate ultrasound and photoacoustic image -guided photothermal cancer therapy using in -vivo tumor -bearing mouse models . The results of these studies suggest that ultrasound and photoacoustic imaging can assist both cancer detection and therapy guidance . |