Anatomical Modeling of the Prostate and Use of Ultrasound Information in Electrical Impedance Tomography (EIT) Reconstruction

We have been exploring the use of ultrasound imaging (US) to support and enhance image reconstruction in EIT. In particular a combined EIT + US system was developed for imaging the prostate during biopsy procedures, with the goal of using electrical properties of tissues for indicating spots where cancer might be present and a more careful sampling of the tissues might be needed. The probe and system used in this project capture co-registered ultrasound and EIT images of the prostate jointly. A complex chain of software was developed for capturing the surface of the prostate from US images and embedding it into FEM meshes, which are used for image reconstruction in EIT. Incorporating a description of the surface of the prostate allows EIT algorithms to focus on reconstructing the electrical properties within the volume of the prostate, as captured by US, and to ultimately achieve better reconstruction performances compared to algorithms that are "unguided."

Pictured above, an FEM model of an EIT transrectal probe, equipped with 30 electrodes (colored patches), is used for imaging the prostate. Captured by ultrasound imaging, the prostate is modeled in the mesh and is present in front of the electrodes.