Facilities

The Biomedical Acoustics Laboratory houses a broad range of biomedical acoustics research activities. Currently, the facility is used for experiments involving high-intensity focused-ultrasound (HIFU). The Biomedical Acoustics Laboratory consists of calibration, fabrication, and exposimetry facilities which include an instrumented water tank for transducer calibration and evaluation. Needle and membrane hydrophones are available for ultrasound pressure measurements. A radiation force balance is also available for measurement of the acoustic output power. The lab also contains workstations for data acquisition and computational modeling.  In addition to laboratory and computational efforts at NCPA, the Biomedical Acoustics group is involved in research projects through collaborations with regional medical faciliites, as well as US Army medical, surgical and research facilities nationwide.

BIOMEDICAL ULTRASOUND LABORATORY

• Fully-equipped wetlab (sink, fume hood, refrigeration).
• Ultrasound exposimetry equipment (high-power ultrasound transducers, pulser/receiver, shear wave transducers)
• Ultrasound calibration facilities (instrumented water tanks, radiation force balance)
• Ex-vivo/Tissue Phantom experiments
• Data acquisition workstations
• Liquid preparation and filtration system (degas, de-ionize)

ULTRASOUND CALIBRATION FACILITY

The Ultrasound Calibration Facility includes an instrumented water tank for transducer calibration and evaluation. Needle and membrane hydrophones are available for ultrasound pressure measurements. A radiation force balance is also available for measurement of the acoustic output power.

TRANSDUCER FABRICATION LABORATORY

• Engineering workstations
• Transducer/Array fabrication
• Electronic/mechanical fabrication

THAD COCHRAN RESEARCH CENTER

The laboratory is approved for pre-clinical trials. In-vivo work is conducted at the Animal Vavarium Facility in the Thad Cochran Research Center.

The University of Mississippi, Central Vivarium (CV) located in the Thad Cochran Research Center is a 10,000-plus square foot facility which meets The Public Health System Guide for the Use and Care of Laboratory Animals definition of a multipurpose facility. The space includes an administrative and technical support area, a staging and receiving area, quarantine rooms, feed and bedding storage, cage wash suite, cage storage, necropsy room, surgery procedure suites, general purpose animal rooms, and species-specific colony rooms. CV utilizes the Edstrom LP 2 Environmental Monitoring system in all animal rooms and procedure rooms.