Winter 2001
Volume 3, Number 2
  


Conference showcases advances
in ultrasonic transducers
By Karen L. Trimbath

The group of 80 researchers, students and engineers fell silent as Dr. Jon Meilstrup, assistant professor of radiology at The Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, showed them a sonograph of a fetus sleeping in its mother’s womb. The highly detailed image, similar to an X-ray, revealed a translucent flap of skin hanging from the fetus’ upper lip — evidence of a cleft palate that can be corrected with surgery, according to Meilstrup.

Sonographs — formed by probes doctors hold against a patient during an ultrasound scan — are an important tool used to diagnose potential medical problems and treat them earlier. Improving ultrasound transducers — the devices in the probes that convert electricity into ultrasound and back again — could lead to even more realistic images, and that’s why engineers and researchers from around the world converged on the Ultrasonic Transducer Engineering Conference, held at The Nittany Lion Inn at the University Park campus.

The conference enabled academic and industrial researchers to learn more about Penn State’s National Institutes of Health (NIH) Resource on Medical Ultrasonic Transducer Technology, the nation’s only resource center for the development of ultrasonic transducer technology for medical diagnostic procedures. The conference also provided continuing education for transducer engineers interested in learning about ongoing and future developments in the ultrasonics and transducers fields.

According to center director Dr. Kirk Shung, professor of bioengineering at Penn State who chaired this year’s conference, most engineers have an incomplete understanding of ultrasonic transducer performance because of the broad interdisciplinary knowledge required.

The resource center is funded by a $3.5 million grant from the National Institutes of Health. This grant builds on an earlier Whitaker Foundation grant that established the Whitaker Center for Medical Ultrasonic Transducer Engineering at Penn State in 1994.

The NIH grant enables faculty at the resource center to focus on needed research and development and collaborative research with academic and industry researchers.

“Penn State is an ideal location for the NIH center, because of the presence of the Materials Research Laboratory at Penn State and ready access to acoustics and biomedical ultrasonics faculty,” Shung said. “We’re here to give engineers the knowledge they need. Transducers are a very special piece of equipment, and they are difficult to make in an optimal way.”

Penn State researchers are focusing on developing ultrasonic transducers and arrays in the very high frequency range, above 30 megahertz (MHz), which will be used in ophthalmology, dermatology and vascular examinations. Center faculty members have just developed a 30-MHz linear array of transducers and plan on forming images with this device. Another goal is to use improved materials to create better clinical images.

Conference presenters addressed the latest research in array and transducer designs, piezoelectric materials, as well as clinical applications of ultrasonic imaging, among other topics. Participants also toured facilities of Penn State’s NIH Resource on Medical Ultrasonic Transducer Technology and attended tutorials given by transducer designers.

Eighty percent of the conference’s attendees work in the ultrasonics industry. The other participants were academic researchers and graduate students affiliated with the Penn State center. A number of the participants from industry work for companies located in central Pennsylvania, including Sound Technology, a subsidiary of Acuson, and Blatek, both located in State College, and Echo Ultrasound, a subsidiary of ATL Ultrasound located in Reedsville.

Dean McHenry, advanced design engineer for Echo Ultrasound, described this conference as the best way to pick up details on the latest advances, as well as a rare chance to hear input from the medical profession, particularly through Meilstrup’s presentation.

“We don’t normally get to see these ultrasound images unless we conduct trial testing at hospitals,” McHenry said. “It’s nice to see if your system really works in clinical applications.”

An outreach program of the College of Engineering

Dr. Jon Meilstrup, assistant professor of radiology at Penn State’s Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, discusses the history of ultrasound images and how technological improvements can help patients during the Ultrasonic Transducer Engineering Conference, held at The Nittany Lion Inn.
Dr. Kirk Shung, professor of bioengineering at Penn State and chair of the Ultrasonic Transducer Engineering Conference, presents an overview of Penn State’s NIH Resource on Medical Ultrasonic Transducer Technology, the nation’s only resource center for the development of ultrasonic transducer technology for medical diagnostic procedures. He is director of the facility.



Recognizing exemplary outreach teaching, research and service
This Penn State faculty member is sharing research with individuals, organizations and communities to make life better:

Dr. Carl A. Kallgren III
Associate Professor of Psychology
Penn State Erie

Dr. Carl A. Kallgren III has been instrumental in soliciting funding and establishing and coordinating services that address the issue of teen pregnancy prevention in Erie County. His establishment of the Center for Organizational Research and Evaluation (CORE) in 1998, with funding from a private benefactor and with support from Penn State, has benefited Erie County communities. He is director of administration and outreach for CORE. In 2000, he presented a paper on “The CORE Model of Social Intervention,” written with Jennifer J. Pelkowski, during the 27th International Congress of Psychology, held in Stockholm, Sweden. In their paper, the authors describe the CORE model this way: “We have developed a new way of thinking about social interventions, in general, and teenage pregnancy prevention interventions, in particular. Rather than inventing new programs, services or agencies to address issues, we have established a university-based, research services center that focuses on providing high-quality evaluation, assistance in identifying and developing funding sources, benchmarking and the identification of ‘best practices.’ By providing these services free of charge to existing adolescent pregnancy prevention service providers, we believe that, over time, we will effectively reduce adolescent pregnancy in our service area.” Kallgren, who also is president-elect of the Northwestern Pennsylvania Psychological Association, serves not only as an educator, but also as a concerned citizen involved with issues relevant to the community.

  

U.Ed.OCE 01-8002/mkm/GSM