Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering

Biomedical Engineering Laboratory

About the Lab

The Biomedical Engineering Laboratory is operated by Assistant Professor Timothy Bigelow. The goal of the research conducted in the Biomedical Engineering Laboratory is to improve medical ultrasound. This goal has two main thrusts:

  • To improve the diagnostic effectiveness of medical ultrasound. Past and current projects in this area have included quantifying the scattering properties of tissue to diagnose cancer without the need for an invasive needle biopsy, and applying statistical signal processing to quantify cervical ripening.  If we can detect cervical ripening, then we could determine if a woman is at risk for preterm delivery weeks before contractions actually begin.  
  • To improve the therapeutic effectiveness of medical ultrasound.  Currently, we are developing an ultrasound therapy system to treat cancer in the liver.  We have also done studies that successfully treated bacterial biofilms using ultrasound.  These biofilms are a major concern when they form on medical implants and currently require a replacement of the implant.  Ultrasound is a highly attractive noninvasive alternative to this surgery.  In the future, we also would like to use ultrasound assisted gene/drug delivery to cure genetic diseases such as Down Syndrome and Fragile X Syndrome.

Lab Equipment

  • a z.one Ultrasound System from ZONARE Medical Systems, Inc. (with a L8-3 Linear Array Transducer and a L14-5sp Intra-operative Linear Array)
  • a 1140LA E&I Power Amplifier (which operates in conjunction with a National Instruments arbitrary waveform generator card to generate therapy pules)
  • a Panametrics-NDT 200 MHz 5900 pulser/receiver
  • an Onda NTR HMA-0200 PVDF membrane hydrophone
  • a computer controlled three-axis Velmex micropositioning system
  • a vacuum chamber system for degassing water 
  • several 1.1 MHz spherically focused, f/1, 6.3 cm focal length, ultrasound therapy transducers 
  • a fiber optic hydrophone 

Current Students

  • Yassin Labyed – EE PhD
  • Jin Xu – ME PhD
  • Kelsey Carvell – EE MS

Current Collaborators

  • Viren Amin – Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
  • Don Sakaguchi  - Department of Genetics, Development, and Cell Biology
  • Larry J. Halverson - Department of Plant Pathology
  • Laura R. Jarboe - Chemical and Biological Engineering
  • Michael Olsen – Mechanical Engineering
  • Rajeev Arora – Department of Horticulture

Primary External Collaborators

  • William D. O’Brien – ECE Department, University of Illinois (and others in same research group)
  • Tim Hall – Medical Physics Department, University of Wisconsin (and others in same research group)
  • Barbara L. McFarlin - College of Nursing, University of Illinois-Chicago