The first prototype ultrasound sensors for a new improved breast screening technique have been developed as part of an Innovate UK funded collaboration between the National Physical Laboratory (NPL), University Hospitals Bristol (UHB), North Bristol NHS Trust (NBT), Precision Acoustics Ltd and Designworks. The team is now looking for commercial partners to translate the novel development into a clinical device.
NHS breast cancer screening in England is currently conducted using X-ray mammography, and further investigations may involve a clinical examination, more X-ray mammograms and conventional ultrasound.
During mammography, each breast is compressed between the two plates of an X-ray machine, which some women find very uncomfortable, and two X-rays are taken at different angles. However, the inability of 2D X-ray mammography to separate overlying tissue can lead to false positives and false negatives, and the hazards associated with ionizing radiation limit the frequency with which X-rays can be performed. Conventional ultrasound is highly operator-dependent and suffers from imaging problems, making cancerous tissue difficult to distinguish from healthy tissue.
NPL, UHB, NBT, Precision Acoustics and Designworks are developing a prototype clinical system for a new breast screening technique – using ultrasound computed tomography (UCT) – that may overcome the problems of diagnosing breast disease using conventional X-ray mammography and ultrasound scans. The new ultrasound method will be safer and lower cost than currently-used screening techniques, and the results should be easier for clinicians to interpret.
NPL has developed and patented a novel detection method employing pyroelectric sensors, which convert ultrasonic energy into heat, generating electrical signals which are eventually used to form the ultrasound image. These large-area thermal sensors should generate far fewer image artefacts than conventional piezoelectric detectors, which are sensitive to the phase of the arriving ultrasound waves.
In the new procedure, the patient

Physicists from the University of Sydney have devised a way to use diamonds to identify cancerous tumours before they become life threatening.
Their reveal how a nano-scale, synthetic version of the precious gem can light up early-stage cancers in non-toxic, non-invasive Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) scans.
Targeting cancers with tailored chemicals is not new but scientists struggle to detect where these chemicals go since, short of a biopsy, there are few ways to see if a treatment has been taken-up by a cancer.
Led by Professor David Reilly from the School of Physics, researchers from the University investigated how nanoscale diamonds could help identify cancers in their earliest stages.
‘We knew nano diamonds were of interest for delivering drugs during chemotherapy because they are largely non-toxic and non-reactive,’ says Professor Reilly.
‘We thought we could build on these non-toxic properties realizing that diamonds have magnetic characteristics enabling them to act as beacons in MRIs. We effectively turned a pharmaceutical problem into a physics problem.’
Professor Reilly’s team turned its attention to hyperpolarizing nano-diamonds, a process of aligning atoms inside a diamond so they create a signal detectable by an MRI scanner.
‘By attaching hyperpolarized diamonds to molecules targeting cancers the technique can allow tracking of the molecules’ movement in the body,’ says Ewa Rej, the paper’s lead author.
‘This is a great example of how quantum physics research tackles real-world problems, in this case opening the way for us to image and target cancers long before they become life-threatening,’ says Professor Reilly.
The next stage of the team’s work involves working with medical researchers to test the new technology on animals. Also on the horizon is research using scorpion venom to target brain tumours with MRI scanning.

University of Sydneyhttp://tinyurl.com/h8qj2ah

Researchers at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center have shown that patients who have chronic pain can reduce their emotional response to the pain through spinal cord stimulation.

A clinical trial by University of Colorado Cancer Center investigators and collaborators at Beaumont Health in Michigan and the University of Texas Medical Branch is evaluating a new method for pinpointing and sparing healthy lung tissue during lung cancer radiotherapy. The group is applying advanced image analysis techniques to 4D CT scans already performed as a standard step in targeting lung cancer radiotherapy, to map areas of lung function without additional testing.