Endoscopic Ultrasound Localization Microscopy for the Evaluation of the Microvasculature of Gastrointestinal Tract Tumors in Rabbits

Objective:
The morphological and hemodynamic characterization of the microvascular network around the gastrointestinal (GI) tract can be of significant clinical value for the early diagnosis and treatment of GI tract cancer. Ultrasound localization microscopy (ULM) imaging has been demonstrated to be capable of resolving the microvascular network. However, the endoscopic application of ULM imaging techniques is still unknown. In this study, an endoscopic ultrasound localization microscopy (e-ULM) imaging technique was developed to evaluate the changes of microvasculature during GI tract tumor growth.
Methods:
A customized circular array transducer (center frequency: 6.8 MHz) and the coherent diverging wave compounding method were used to generate B-mode images. Spatiotemporal singular value decomposition processing was used to eliminate the background signals before signal localizations. The centroids of spatially isolated signals were localized and summed to generate the final super-resolution image.
Results:
The final microvasculature map of a rabbit GI tract tumor reveals that e-ULM can be used to surpass the diffraction limit in traditional endoscopic ultrasound (EUS) imaging. Furthermore, it is observed that data from different stages of tumor growth exhibit significant differences in microvascular pattern and density.
Conclusion:
Our study demonstrated the implementation and application of an in vivo e-ULM imaging technique for the evaluation of the microvasculature of GI tumors.
Significance:
The efficient e-ULM imaging technique shows potential for use in the detection of GI tract tumor microcirculation changes and subsequent diagnosis of GI tract cancer.