@article{durham_kim_eltz_caskey_dayton_2022, title={POLYVINYL ALCOHOL CRYOGELS FOR ACOUSTIC CHARACTERIZATION OF PHASE-CHANGE CONTRAST AGENTS}, volume={48}, ISSN={["1879-291X"]}, DOI={10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2022.01.007}, abstractNote={Phase-change contrast agents (PCCAs) consisting of lipid-encapsulated low-boiling-point perfluorocarbons can be used in conjunction with ultrasound for diagnostic and therapeutic applications. One benefit of PCCAs is site-specific activation, whereby the liquid core is acoustically vaporized into a bubble detectable via ultrasound imaging. For further evaluation of PCCAs in a variety of applications, it is useful to disperse these nanodroplets into an acoustically compatible stationary matrix. However, many traditional phantom preparations require heating, which causes premature thermal activation of low-boiling-point PCCAs. Polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) cryogels do not require heat to set. Here we propose a simple method for the incorporation of the low-boiling-point PCCAs using octafluoropropane (OFP) and decafluorobutane (DFB) into PVA cryogels for a variety of acoustic characterization applications. We determined the utility of the phantoms by activating droplets with a focused transducer, visualizing the lesions with ultrasound imaging. At 1 MHz, droplet activation was consistently observed at 2.0 and 4.0 MPa for OFP and DFB, respectively.}, number={5}, journal={ULTRASOUND IN MEDICINE AND BIOLOGY}, author={Durham, Phillip G. and Kim, Jinwook and Eltz, Katherine M. and Caskey, Charles F. and Dayton, Paul A.}, year={2022}, month={May}, pages={954–960} }