Fundamental image quality parameters of poroelastography

Poroelastography is an emerging elastographic technique that aims at imaging the temporal mechanical behavior of fluid-filled tissues. While standard elastographic methods focus primarily on the visualization of soft and hard tissue regions as being indicative of tissue pathological changes, poroelastography allows imaging several novel parameters that are related to the tissue's effective compressibility and permeability. Medical areas where poroelastography could have a significant impact include cancer treatment imaging and lymphedema assessment. Despite compelling motivations driving the development of this novel modality, the current literature in this field is limited to a relatively small number of publications. These studies suggest the technical feasibility of poroelastography methods but do not comprehensively tackle fundamental issues of clinical importance. Image quality performance of poroelastography is still largely unknown. In this paper, we present the results of recent theoretical, simulation and experimental studies carried out in our laboratory, which address fundamental mechanical and noise limitations of various poroelastography techniques.