Acoustic Optimization and Standardized Fabrication of a Biomimetic Liver Phantom for Quantitative Multimodal Imaging
5 affiliations
- 1Radiology
- 2UT Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas
- 3Medical Physics and Radiology
- 4University of Wisconsin-Madison
- 5Biomedical Engineering
Abstract
We previously developed a structurally biomimetic liver phantom composed of alginate units that reproduce the scale and organization of hepatic lobules. Here, we optimized the non-steatotic baseline formulation and fabrication workflow to more closely reproduce normal liver properties across ultrasound, CT, and MRI. The updated formulation was evaluated using clinical imaging systems, followed by quantitative water-tank characterization of speed of sound (SoS) and attenuation coefficient (AC). Increasing alginate concentration and incorporating glycerol into both the alginate phase and calcium chloride crosslinking bath reduced the SoS mismatch while preserving the biomimetic architecture. Fabrication was further standardized using 3D-printed molds to precisely control phantom volume and component ratios across clinical-imaging and water-tank configurations. On clinical systems, the updated formulation achieved a SoS of ~ 1540 m/s and AC of ~ 0.4 dB/cm/MHz, together with CT attenuation of ~ 44 HU, MRI-PDFF of ~ 2.5 % and T2* ~ 41 ms. Quantitative immersion-based characterization independently confirmed liver-relevant acoustic properties with a SoS of ~ 1557 m/s and AC of ~ 0.34 dB/cm/MHz at 3.5 MHz). Together, these values were within or approached reported ranges for non-steatotic liver. The resulting platform provides a reproducible, standardized multimodal baseline for the subsequent incorporation of controlled steatotic microstructure and development of quantitative imaging biomarkers.
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BibTeX
@misc{sipahi2026acoustic,
title = {{Acoustic Optimization and Standardized Fabrication of a Biomimetic Liver Phantom for Quantitative Multimodal Imaging}},
author = {Vatan Sipahi and Tara Movaghar and Anbarin Khalid and Shariq Ali and Liqiang Ren and Yue Zhang and Ivan M. Rosado-Mendez and David T. Fetzer and Caroline de Gracia Lux},
howpublished = {ChemRxiv},
year = {2026},
month = sep,
doi = {10.26434/chemrxiv.15009390/v1},
url = {https://chemrxiv.org/doi/full/10.26434/chemrxiv.15009390/v1},
note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Acoustic Optimization and Standardized Fabrication of a Biomimetic Liver Phantom for Quantitative Multimodal Imaging
AU - Vatan Sipahi
AU - Tara Movaghar
AU - Anbarin Khalid
AU - Shariq Ali
AU - Liqiang Ren
AU - Yue Zhang
AU - Ivan M. Rosado-Mendez
AU - David T. Fetzer
AU - Caroline de Gracia Lux
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/09/23
PB - ChemRxiv
DO - 10.26434/chemrxiv.15009390/v1
UR - https://chemrxiv.org/doi/full/10.26434/chemrxiv.15009390/v1
AB - We previously developed a structurally biomimetic liver phantom composed of alginate units that reproduce the scale and organization of hepatic lobules. Here, we optimized the non-steatotic baseline formulation and fabrication workflow to more closely reproduce normal liver properties across ultrasound, CT, and MRI. The updated formulation was evaluated using clinical imaging systems, followed by quantitative water-tank characterization of speed of sound (SoS) and attenuation coefficient (AC). Increasing alginate concentration and incorporating glycerol into both the alginate phase and calcium chloride crosslinking bath reduced the SoS mismatch while preserving the biomimetic architecture. Fabrication was further standardized using 3D-printed molds to precisely control phantom volume and component ratios across clinical-imaging and water-tank configurations. On clinical systems, the updated formulation achieved a SoS of ~ 1540 m/s and AC of ~ 0.4 dB/cm/MHz, together with CT attenuation of ~ 44 HU, MRI-PDFF of ~ 2.5 % and T2* ~ 41 ms. Quantitative immersion-based characterization independently confirmed liver-relevant acoustic properties with a SoS of ~ 1557 m/s and AC of ~ 0.34 dB/cm/MHz at 3.5 MHz). Together, these values were within or approached reported ranges for non-steatotic liver. The resulting platform provides a reproducible, standardized multimodal baseline for the subsequent incorporation of controlled steatotic microstructure and development of quantitative imaging biomarkers.
ER -