Super-resolution ultrasound to aid testicular lesion characterisation

Changes in microvascular structure and flow is of clinical importance in the study of a number of disease processes such as cancer and diabetes. Ultrasound is often the primary imaging procedure performed to determine appropriate treatment or surgery for testicular lesions. Currently, however, differentiation and diagnosis of both benign and malignant testicular tumours such as seminomas, leydig cell tumours and lymphomas are often challenging. Contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) has been used to aid their characterisation [1]. There are, however, a variety of benign testicular lesions that can mimic testicular malignancies. Ultrasound super-resolution (US-SR) techniques have been able to visualise vascular structures in vitro and in vivo beyond the diffraction limit by localizing individual microbubble signals. In this work, we aim to apply US-SR processing to clinical data to aid diagnostic confidence.