Six patients with either malignant pleural effusion or empyema, in whom multiple conventional attempts at thoracocentesis were unsuccessful, were evaluated by ultrasound. In each case, a subsequent thoracocentesis guided by ultrasound produced sufficient fluid to enable a diagnosis to be established. In no case was pneumothorax produced.

Herein, the concept and data for cancer treatment that combines ultrasound and nanoparticles is reported. Non-toxic gold and magnetic nanoparticles were used to enhance the ultrasound destruction of cancer cells in vitro. Separate monolayers of normal and cancer cells were treated by focused ultrasound with the result of more pronounced damage of cancer cells when biocompatible gold and magneti...

Freehand 3D ultrasound is acquired by attaching a position sensor to the probe of a conventional 2D diagnostic ultrasound machine. As the clinician moves the probe, its position and orientation is recorded with respect to some fixed datum. The 2D ultrasound images are also recorded. If both the images and the position readings are independently time-stamped then they can be matched up to create...

Therapeutic approaches using gene-based medicines promise alternatives or adjuncts to conventional cancer treatment. Because of its non-invasive nature, ultrasound, as a membrane-permeabilising stimulus has the potential to be highly competitive with viral gene delivery and existing non-viral alternatives. In optimising ultrasound-mediated, microbubble-assisted (MB101) gene tranfection in vitro...

Spatial representations can be derived not only by direct perception, but also through cognitive mediation. Conventional or ex-situ ultrasound displays, which displace imaged data to a remote screen, require both types of process. To determine the depth of a target hidden beneath a surface, ultrasound users must both perceive how deeply the ultrasound transducer indents the surface and interpre...

Microbubbles are widely used as contrast agents to improve the diagnostic capability of conventional, highly speckled, low-contrast ultrasound imaging. However, while microbubbles can be used for molecular imaging, these agents are limited to the vascular space due to their large size (> 1 μm). Smaller microbubbles are desired but their ultrasound visualization is limited due to lower echogenic...

A simple and efficient synthesis of 1,2-diarylethanols has been developed. The procedure involved the reaction between a variety of toluene derivatives and aryl aldehydes under conventional heating and ultrasound irradiation. This procedure possesses several advantages such as operational simplicity, high yield, safety and environment benignancy. Ultrasound was proved to be very helpful to the ...

Pulmonary imaging in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) relies traditionally on the conventional chest radiogram. Translating evidences from adult emergency medicine, pediatricians and neonatologists have recently started to apply lung ultrasonography to the critical infant and child with respiratory problems [1]. Because of the high impedance of a normally aerated lung, an ultrasound scan...

Osteoarthritis (OA) is a common degenerative musculoskeletal disease highly prevalent in aging societies worldwide. Traditionally, knee OA is diagnosed using conventional radiography. However, structural changes of articular cartilage or menisci cannot be directly evaluated using this method. On the other hand, ultrasound is a promising tool able to provide direct information on soft tissue deg...

Accurate and efficient identification of nerves is of great importance during many ultrasound-guided clinical procedures, including nerve blocks and prostate biopsies. It can be challenging to visualise nerves with conventional ultrasound imaging, however. One of the challenges is that nerves can have very similar appearances to nearby structures such as tendons. Several recent studies have hig...