Verification and commercialization of a novel brain mimicking Acoustic Contact Fluid (ACF)

Ultrasound-guided brain surgery is an established method at St. Olav's Hospital as well as in several other hospitals. Ultrasound is used actively during brain tumour operations, in order to remove the tumor safely as the transition from tumour tissue to normal tissue can be difficult to see with the bare eye even under the microscope. Ultraound is able to detect tumour tissue. However, noise can appear in the images towards the end of surgery due to different attenuation in brain and salt water used to p rovide acoustic coupling between the ultrasound transducer and the tissue. Researchers and clinicians affiliated with the National Centre for ultrasound and image-guided therapy (collaboration between St. Olavs Hospital, NTNU and SINTEF) has developed a new acoustic coupling medium in the form of a liquid that has the same acoustic properties as normal brain tissue. By using the new acoustic coupling fluid instead of saline, a significant reduction of the surgery related noise in ultrasound images can b e achieved. Thus, the fluid has the potential to detect and remove more tumor tissue. A first clinical trial of the fluid in order to verify the improvement of image quality and safety will be performed in the FORNY project. The project will also ensure intellectual property rights and further commercialization of the patent pending fluid.