The development of a robotic approach to therapeutic ultrasound

Despite the recent wealth of research into therapy with high intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU), its clinical application still has limitations. These relate to the accuracy of the HIFU beam, the ability to visualize the target volume, and the understanding of the beam interaction with tissue. In the work reported in this paper, the output characteristics of a single channel HIFU transducer have been investigated in detail with the aid of a six-axis robot. Results show that by altering the drive parameters of the transducer clearly defined thermal or mechanical damage can be produced. The nature and patterns of damage produced by preprogrammed treatment volumes are now being investigated in tissue.