REAL TIME CONTROL OF HIGH INTENSITY FOCUSED ULTRASOUND USING MAGNETIC RESONANCE IMAGING

• US 20140194728A1
• Filed: 08/27/2012
• Published: 07/10/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 08/30/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Profound Medical Inc. (Profound Medical Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Koninklijke Philips N.V.
• Inventors: Vahala, Erkki Tapani
• Granted Patent: US 10,459,043 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 600/411
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 17/320016 Endoscopic cutting instruments, e.g. arthroscopes, resectoscopes A61B10/0233, A61B17/29, A61B17/3207 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 2017/320069 for ablating tissue
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 2090/374 NMR or MRI
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/0036 including treatment, e.g., using an implantable medical device, ablating, ventilating
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/055 involving electronic [EMR] or nuclear [NMR] magnetic resonance, e.g. magnetic resonance imaging
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 8/485 involving measuring strain or elastic properties
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 8/565 involving data transmission via a network
• CPC Class Codes: A61N 7/02 Localised ultrasound hyperthermia hyperthermia in general A61F7/00
• CPC Class Codes: G01R 33/285 Invasive instruments, e.g. catheters or biopsy needles, specially adapted for tracking, guiding or visualization by NMR
• CPC Class Codes: G01R 33/4814 MR combined with ultrasound
• CPC Class Codes: G01R 33/4818 MR characterised by data acquisition along a specific k-space trajectory or by the temporal order of k-space coverage, e.g. centric or segmented coverage of k-space

Abstract

A medical apparatus (300, 400, 500) comprises a high intensity focused ultrasound system (322) configured for for sonicating a target volume (340) of a subject (318). The medical apparatus further comprises a magnetic resonance imaging system (302) for acquiring magnetic resonance data (356, 358, 360, 368, 374) from an imaging zone (308). The treatment volume is within the imaging zone. The medical apparatus further comprises a memory (352) containing machine executable,a control module (382, 402) for controlling the sonication of the target volume using the magnetic resonance data as a control parameter, and a processor (346). Execution of the instructions causes the processor to repeatedly acquire (102, 202) magnetic resonance data in real time using the magnetic resonance imaging system and control (104, 206) sonication of the target volume by the high intensity focused ultra-sound system in real time using the sonication control module and the magnetic resonance data.

Claims

1. A medical apparatus comprising:

a high intensity focused ultrasound system configured for generating focused ultrasonic energy for sonicating a target volume of a subject;

a magnetic resonance imaging system for acquiring magnetic resonance data from an imaging zone, wherein the treatment volume is within the imaging zone;

a memory containing machine executable instructions for controlling the medical apparatus;

a control module for controlling the sonication of the target volume using the magnetic resonance data as a control parameter;

a processor for controlling the medical apparatus, wherein execution of the instructions causes the processor to repeatedly;

acquire magnetic resonance data in real time using the magnetic resonance imaging system; and

control sonication of the target volume by the high intensity focused ultrasound system in real time using the sonication control module and the magnetic resonance data and

wherein the magnetic resonance data comprises subsampled magnetic resonance data (358) and image magnetic resonance data, wherein the medical apparatus further comprises an image reconstruction module for reconstructing the image magnetic resonance data into a magnetic resonance image, where the sonication control module is configured for using at least the subsampled magnetic resonance data as the control parameter, and wherein execution of the instructions further causes the processor to repeatedly reconstruct an image using the image reconstruction module and the image magnetic resonance data and

the magnetic resonance imaging system acquires the subsampled magnetic resonance data and image magnetic resonance data in an interleaved fashion.

4. The medical apparatus of claim 1, wherein the subsampled magnetic resonance data is subsampled in comparison to the image magnetic resonance data.

5. The medical apparatus of claim 4, the subsampled magnetic resonance data is subsampled by under sampling in k-space.

6. The medical apparatus of claim 5, wherein the under sampling of k-space of is non-uniformly distributed in k-space.

7. The medical apparatus of claim 5, wherein under sampling of the k-space is performed using any one of the following:

a predetermined sampling pattern, a random sampling pattern, by sampling k-space elements determined by a Poisson-disk distribution, by sampling k-space within a predetermined region of k-space, and by sampling fully a kernel of k-space below a predetermined value of k and sparsely sampling above the predetermined value of k.

8. The medical apparatus of claim 1, wherein the subsampled magnetic resonance data comprises magnetic resonance navigator data.

9. The medical apparatus of claim 1, wherein the medical imaging system further comprises an elastrographic ultrasound system, wherein the instructions further cause the processor to activate the elastrographic ultrasound system when acquiring at least a portion of the magnetic resonance data, wherein the sonication control module is configured to use at least the portion of the magnetic resonance data acquired when the elastrographic ultrasound system was active for controlling the sonication.

10. The medical apparatus of claim 1, wherein execution of the instructions further causes the controller to repeatedly calculate an energy deposition map using the magnetic resonance data, wherein the sonication control module is configured to determine sonication trajectories and timing values in accordance with the energy deposition map.

11. The medical apparatus of claim 1, wherein execution of the instructions causes the processor to broadcast the magnetic resonance data to the sonication control module.

12. The medical apparatus of claim 1, wherein the sonication control module is configured to control the high intensity focused ultrasound system without generating images from the magnetic resonance data.

2-3. -3. (canceled)

13. A method of operating a medical apparatus, wherein the medical apparatus comprises a high intensity focused ultrasound system configured for generating focused ultrasonic energy for sonicating a target volume of a subject, wherein the medical apparatus further comprises a magnetic resonance imaging system for acquiring magnetic resonance data from an imaging zone, wherein the treatment volume is within the imaging zone, wherein the medical apparatus further comprises a control module for controlling the sonication of the target volume using the magnetic resonance data as a control parameter, wherein the method comprises the steps of repeatedly:

acquiring magnetic resonance data in real time using the magnetic resonance imaging system; and

controlling sonication of the target volume by the high intensity focused ultrasound system in real time using the sonication control module and the magnetic resonance data and

wherein the magnetic resonance data comprises subsampled magnetic resonance data and image magnetic resonance data are acquired in an interleaved fashion by the magnetic resonance imaging system,

reconstructing an image reconstruction module by way of the image magnetic resonance data into a magnetic resonance image,

using at least the subsampled magnetic resonance data as the control parameter by the sonication control module,

repeatedly reconstructing by the processor an image using the image reconstruction module and the image magnetic resonance data.

14. A computer program product comprising machine executable instructions for execution by a processor controlling a medical apparatus, wherein the medical apparatus comprises a high intensity focused ultrasound system configured for generating focused ultrasonic energy for sonicating a target volume of a subject, wherein the medical apparatus further comprises a magnetic resonance imaging system for acquiring magnetic resonance data from an imaging zone, wherein the medical apparatus further comprises a control module for controlling the sonication of the target volume using the magnetic resonance data as a control parameter, wherein execution of the instructions causes the processor to repeatedly:

acquire magnetic resonance data in real time using the magnetic resonance imaging system; and

control sonication of the target volume by the high intensity focused ultrasound system in real time using the sonication control module and the magnetic resonance data and

acquire the magnetic resonance data comprising subsampled magnetic resonance data and image magnetic resonance data are in an interleaved fashion by the magnetic resonance imaging system,

reconstruct an image reconstruction module by way of the image magnetic resonance data into a magnetic resonance image,

use at least the subsampled magnetic resonance data as the control parameter by the sonication control module,

repeatedly reconstruct by the processor an image using the image reconstruction module and the image magnetic resonance data.