Wearing an ultrasound patch around the neck. Image source: A team of engineers from the School of Engineering at the University of California, San Diego has developed a stretchable ultrasound array that can perform continuous, non-invasive three-dimensional imaging of tissues 4 centimeters below the surface of human skin at a spatial resolution of 0.5 millimeters. The research was published in Nature biomedical engineering. The device consists of a 16X16 array, each part consisting of composite components and a backing layer made of silver epoxy resin composite material. Researchers integrated a series of ultrasound components into a soft elastic matrix and connected them using wavy stretchable electrodes. The resulting elastic imaging monitoring system can provide continuous, non-invasive, and three-dimensional mechanical performance mapping for deep tissues, providing key information on disease progression such as cancer. It can also be used to monitor muscles, tendons, and ligaments for diagnosis and treatment of sports injuries. Cancer usually leads to cell hardening, and treatment for liver and cardiovascular diseases or some chemotherapy drugs may also affect tissue stiffness. Continuous elastography can help evaluate tissue hardness and drug delivery and efficacy. Therefore, this wearable ultrasound patch not only completes the detection function of traditional ultrasound, but also breaks through the limitations of traditional ultrasound technology, allowing patients to continuously monitor their health status anytime and anywhere. This helps to reduce misdiagnosis and death, and has the advantages of non-invasive and low-cost. This array fits the human skin and is acoustically coupled to it. In testing, this device is used to detect the microstructure damage of volunteer muscles before the onset of soreness, and to monitor the dynamic recovery process of muscle damage during physical therapy. (New News Agency)