Direct evidence of cavitation in vivo from diagnostic ultrasound.

Recent increases in the pressure output of diagnostic ultrasound scanners have led to an interest in establishing thresholds for bioeffects in many organs including the lungs of mammals. Damage may be mediated by inertial cavitation, yet there have been no such direct observations in vivo. To explore the hypothesis of cavitation-based bioeffects from diagnostic ultrasound, research has been performed on the thresholds of damage in rat lungs exposed to 4.0-MHz pulsed Doppler and color Doppler ultrasound. A 30-MHz active cavitation detection scheme complementing these studies provides the first direct evidence of cavitation in vivo from diagnostic ultrasound pulses.