A fully-automated insonation system for in vitro investigations of ultrasound-mediated targeted drug delivery

Focused ultrasound (US) produces clinically useful bioeffects such as hyperthermia, cavitation and radiation force. A focused US mediated targeted drug delivery (UmTDD) capsule endoscope was developed previously to explore treatment of gastrointestinal conditions such as Crohn's disease (SonoCAIT [1]). This included focused US transducers to enhance drug uptake into the bowel wall. In further development, a benchtop system was developed [2] using the same ultrasound sources. However, this system was limited and could only insonate single samples, required significant human intervention, and could only work on therapeutic agents in suspension rather than introduce them selectively. This paper describes the development of a fully automated system to overcome these issues and describes the development of application-specific focused US transducers.