Method Of Applying Acoustic Energy Effective To Alter Transport Or Cell Viability

A method for reversibly, or irreversibly, altering the permeability of cells, tissues or other biological barriers, to molecules to be transported into or through these materials, through the application of acoustic energy, is enhanced by applying the ultrasound in combination with devices for monitoring and/or implementing feedback controls. The acoustic energy is applied directly or indirectly to the cells or tissue whose permeability is to be altered, at a frequency and intensity appropriate to alter the permeability to achieve the desired effect, such as the transport of endogenous or exogenous molecules and/or fluid, for drug delivery, measurement of analyte, removal of fluid, alteration of cell or tissue viability or alteration of structure of materials such as kidney or gall bladder stones. In the preferred embodiment, the method includes measuring the strength of the acoustic field applied to the cell or tissue at the applied frequency or other frequencies, and using the acoustic measurement to modify continued or subsequent application of acoustic energy to the cell or tissue. In another preferred embodiment, the method further includes simultaneously, previously, or subsequently exposing the cell or tissue to the chemical or biological agent to be transported into or across the cell or tissue. In another preferred application, the method includes removing biological fluid or molecules from the cells or tissue simultaneously, previously or subsequently to the application of acoustic energy and, optionally, assaying the biological fluid or molecules.Georgia Tech Research Corporatio

VISUALIZATION AND CHARACTERIZATION OF ULTRASONIC CAVITATING ATOMIZER AND OTHER AUTOMOTIVE PAINT SPRAYERS USING INFRARED THERMOGRAPHY

The disintegration of a liquid jet emerging from a nozzle has been under investigation for several decades. A direct consequence of the liquid jet disintegration process is droplet formation. The breakup of a liquid jet into discrete droplets can be brought about by the use of a diverse forcing mechanism. Cavitation has been thought to assist the atomization process. Previous experimental studies, however, have dealt with cavitation as a secondary phenomenon assisting the primary atomization mechanism. In this dissertation, the role of the energy created by the collapse of cavitation bubbles, together with the liquid pressure perturbation is explicitly configured as a principal mechanism for the disintegration of the liquid jet. A prototype of an atomizer that uses this concept as a primary atomization mechanism was developed and experimentally tested using water as working fluid. The atomizer fabrication process and the experimental characterization results are presented. The parameters tested include liquid injection pressure, ultrasonic horn tip frequency, and the liquid flow rate. The experimental results obtained demonstrate improvement in the atomization of water. To fully characterize the new atomizer, a novel infrared thermography-based technique for the characterization and visualization of liquid sprays was developed. The technique was tested on the new atomizer and two automotive paint applicators. The technique uses an infrared thermography-based measurement in which a uniformly heated background acts as a thermal radiation source, and an infrared camera as the receiver. The infrared energy emitted by the source in traveling through the spray is attenuated by the presence of the droplets. The infrared intensity is captured by the receiver showing the attenuation in the image as a result of the presence of the spray. The captured thermal image is used to study detailed macroscopic features of the spray flow field and the evolution of the droplets as they are transferred from the applicator to the target surface. In addition, the thermal image is post-processed using theoretical and empirical equations to extract information from which the liquid volume fraction and number density within the spray are estimated

Nanostructured sonogels

Acoustic cavitation effects in sol-gel liquid processing permits to obtain nanostructured materials, with size-dependent properties. The so-called "hot spots" produce very high temperatures and pressures which act as nanoreactors. Ultrasounds force the dissolution and the reaction stars. The products (alcohol, water and silanol) help to continue the dissolution, being catalyst content, temperature bath and alkyl group length dependent. Popular choices used in the preparation of silica-based gels are tetramethoxysilane (TMOS), Si(OCH3)4 and tetraethoxysilane (TEOS), Si(OC 2H5)4. The resultant "sonogels" are denser gels with finer and homogeneous porosity than those of classic ones. They have a high surface/volume ratio and are built by small particles (1 nm radius) and a high cross-linked network with low -OH surface coverage radicals. In this way a cluster model is presented based on randomly-packed spheres in several hierarchical levels that represent the real sonoaerogel. Organic modified silicates (ORMOSIL) were obtained by supercritical drying in ethanol of the corresponding alcogel producing a hybrid organic/inorganic aerogel. The new material takes the advantages of the organic polymers as flexibility, low density, toughness and formability whereas the inorganic part contributes with surface hardness, modulus strength, transparency and high refractive index. The sonocatalytic method has proven to be adequate to prepare silica matrices for fine and uniform dispersion of CdS and PbS quantum dots (QDs), which show exciton quantum confinement. We present results of characterization of these materials, such as nitrogen physisorption, small angle X-ray/neutrons scattering, electron microscopy, uniaxial compression and nanoindentation. Finally these materials find application as biomaterials for tissue engineering and for CO2 sequestration by means the carbonation reaction.Ministerio de Ciencia y Tecnología MAT2005-158

A simple model of ultrasound propagation in a cavitating liquid. Part I: Theory, nonlinear attenuation and traveling wave generation

The bubbles involved in sonochemistry and other applications of cavitation oscillate inertially. A correct estimation of the wave attenuation in such bubbly media requires a realistic estimation of the power dissipated by the oscillation of each bubble, by thermal diffusion in the gas and viscous friction in the liquid. Both quantities and calculated numerically for a single inertial bubble driven at 20 kHz, and are found to be several orders of magnitude larger than the linear prediction. Viscous dissipation is found to be the predominant cause of energy loss for bubbles small enough. Then, the classical nonlinear Caflish equations describing the propagation of acoustic waves in a bubbly liquid are recast and simplified conveniently. The main harmonic part of the sound field is found to fulfill a nonlinear Helmholtz equation, where the imaginary part of the squared wave number is directly correlated with the energy lost by a single bubble. For low acoustic driving, linear theory is recovered, but for larger drivings, namely above the Blake threshold, the attenuation coefficient is found to be more than 3 orders of magnitude larger then the linear prediction. A huge attenuation of the wave is thus expected in regions where inertial bubbles are present, which is confirmed by numerical simulations of the nonlinear Helmholtz equation in a 1D standing wave configuration. The expected strong attenuation is not only observed but furthermore, the examination of the phase between the pressure field and its gradient clearly demonstrates that a traveling wave appears in the medium

Study of fluid transients in closed conduits annual report no. 1

Atmospheric density effect on computation of earth satellite orbit

Time resolved tracking of a sound scatterer in a turbulent flow: non-stationary signal analysis and applications

It is known that ultrasound techniques yield non-intrusive measurements of hydrodynamic flows. For example, the study of the echoes produced by a large number of particle insonified by pulsed wavetrains has led to a now standard velocimetry technique. In this paper, we propose to extend the method to the continuous tracking of one single particle embedded in a complex flow. This gives a Lagrangian measurement of the fluid motion, which is of importance in mixing and turbulence studies. The method relies on the ability to resolve in time the Doppler shift of the sound scattered by the continuously insonfied particle. For this signal processing problem two classes of approaches are used: time-frequency analysis and parametric high resolution methods. In the first class we consider the spectrogram and reassigned spectrogram, and we apply it to detect the motion of a small bead settling in a fluid at rest. In more non-stationary turbulent flows where methods in the second class are more robust, we have adapted an Approximated Maximum Likelihood technique coupled with a generalized Kalman filter.Comment: 16 pages 9 figure

Potential use of ultrasound in chemical monitoring

The objective of this study was to examine the potential of combining sonication with other technologies for monitoring specific classes of organic pollutants in water. The research specifically addressed using ultrasonic processors to decompose organochlorine compounds into ions which could be detected using a specific ion electrode as a screening method for organochlorine pollutants. Changes in chloride, conductivity, and pH were measured using commercially available equipment before and after sonication in order to detect the presence of the organochlorine pollutant. Chloride ion could be detected in aqueous solutions of low ppm concentrations of carbon tetrachloride, chloroform, and trichloroethylene after one minute sonication. The increases of Cl{dollar}\sp-{dollar} were accompanied by increases in conductivity and decreases of pH. Ion chromatography of solutions before and after sonication showed that formate ion was also formed. Aromatic and polyaromatic chloro compounds represented by chlorobenzene and polychlorobiphenyls, respectively, did not form chloride ion as readily as did carbon tetrachloride, chloroform, and trichloroethylene. The results achieved with the organochlorine compounds tested serve as proof-of-principle and form a base of information which can be used to develop ultrasound monitoring methods for these compounds. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)