Ultrasound Imaging and Elastography

Elastography extends conventional ultrasound and MRI by measuring how stiff or compliant tissues are, exploiting the fact that diseased tissue — a tumor, a fibrotic liver, an inflamed tendon — typically differs in mechanical properties from healthy tissue long before it looks different on a standard anatomical image. Techniques such as shear wave imaging and acoustic radiation force impulse imaging send precisely timed mechanical perturbations into the body and track how fast the resulting waves travel, converting that speed into quantitative stiffness maps that clinicians can use to characterize breast lesions, stage liver fibrosis, or assess muscle function without a biopsy. Magnetic resonance elastography applies the same physical principles at higher spatial resolution and deeper penetration, opening access to organs like the brain and heart that are difficult to interrogate with surface ultrasound. Active research is working to standardize stiffness measurements across different scanner manufacturers and probe frequencies, and to determine how reliably elastographic biomarkers can replace or reduce invasive tissue sampling in routine clinical workflows.

Works

36,163

Total citations

466,739

Keywords

Ultrasound ElastographyTissue Elasticity MappingShear Wave ImagingClinical ApplicationsSoft Tissue ElasticityMagnetic Resonance Elastography