Grant: Operating Grant

This project aims to develop a new contrast agent for ultrasound imaging that will provide diagnostic information not available in current medical ultrasound images. 'Nanodroplets' of a liquid perfluorocarbon, a fraction of a millionth of a metre in size, are injected into a vein and allowed circulate, during which time they diffuse into the body of a cancer because of the tendency of cancer blood vessels to have 'leaky' walls. Ultrasound energy applied through the skin is used to convert the droplet into microbubbles, which are easily detectable using methods developed in the investigator's laboratory and widely used in clinical imaging systems. These images will then be able to show a cancer otherwise undetectable by ultrasound. The project focuses on the optimal composition of the droplets and the sound used to convert them to bubbles; the behaviour of the droplets when injected into animal models of cancer and their detection by ultrasound imaging after acoustic activation. It is anticipated that such a method will provide ultrasound, the most widely used imaging method in medicine, with a new technique for the detection of cancer.