Ultrasonography-based motion tracking for MRgFUS

Non-invasive treatment of moving organs like liver and kidney with high intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU/FUS) is challenging. The highly precise HIFU ablation requires real-time knowledge of tumor position with mm precision. The aim of this work was to build up a magnetic resonance imaging compatible tracking device using diagnostic ultrasound imaging for MR guided FUS (MRgFUS). The hardware of the developed US-tracking system comprises the ultrasound beam former with a screen directly placed in front of the MR-magnet, a linear and a special ultrasound tracking probe. The tracking probe (2x64 element phased array) can acquire two perpendicularly oriented US-image planes for quasi 3D tracking. The US-data are sent to a workstation in the console room of the MRI scanner which controls the whole tracking device. The tracking software (Sonoplan II) analyzes the ultrasound image stream and calculates the actual position of pre-defined contours. Beside the 2D-translation, the tracking algorithm analyzes the rotation as well as the 2D scaling of the contour. The developed US-tracking system proved MR-compatibility in 1.5 and 3 T MR-systems and enabled simultaneous MR-and US-imaging and motion tracking. In the next step, the tracking system will be combined with an MRgFUS unit.