Ultrasound imaging gives health care professionals a panorama of diagnostic information to improve their patients’ health.

The benefits of ultrasound are far-reaching: it’s a safe, fast and cost-effective way to obtain images that help doctors see and understand what’s happening in the body.

At the University of Memphis, we’re conducting research that will help us expand the benefits of ultrasound to a wider range of applications.

This is important because we’re trying to improve access to medical imaging, as well as lower health care costs.

The Memphis community has many underserved populations, and we hope that by creating low-cost technologies through our research, these communities can receive the same level of care as anyone else.

The quantitative methods we’re developing are very computationally intensive, so we’re not aiming to make a live video. However, we’re constantly leveraging new digital electronics and computing to make the image reconstruction process faster.

We believe that an ultrasound cross-section of the body can be comparably valuable to a clinician, just like an MRI or a CT.

Diagnostic Benefits

Our research in ultrasound technology has the potential to revolutionize medical imaging. By creating quantitative images based on acoustic properties, we can provide clinicians with a more accurate definition of what is considered normal and abnormal.

Additionally, this research will be particularly valuable in pediatric imaging. Children often have difficulty sitting still for long periods of time during traditional imaging procedures like MRIs. Our technology can provide a more comfortable and efficient experience for young patients, without the need for sedation.

Finally, our technology will also be more diagnostically unique and useful. By using lower frequencies, we can achieve better transmission and penetration. This means clinicians can obtain more detailed and accurate images over a broader field of view, leading to better diagnoses and treatment plans.

Different imaging modalities, like ultrasound, MRI and CT scans, are always sort of in a competition, but they ultimately present different information.

Our research isn’t meant to make another modality useless but rather to build a new tool for clinicians to have at their disposal. We’re still in the early stages, but we are excited by the different applications of this technology, including its potential uses in emergency environments and within the military.

Research by Community

I am grateful for the opportunity to be a part of this groundbreaking research and to work with such talented students and faculty.

We have many funded active projects, so our students receive broad training across transducer array design and fabrication, system integration and beam forming methods. The students have a sense of sustained curiosity, and they seize new opportunities to grow and learn. It’s really a thrill to watch them advance and thrive.

Together, we are making a difference in the field of ultrasound technology and in the lives of those in our community. By improving access to medical imaging and lowering costs, we are helping to create a more equitable health care system for all.

Being part of the University of Memphis’ Biomedical Engineering department is a privilege.

I am excited to see the impact our research will continue to have in the field of medical imaging and beyond.

Research in a Minute is part of a series from the University of Memphis showcasing the innovative research being done by our faculty. 

Watch Dr. Carl Herickhoff’s Research in a Minute video below.