Key Points
- Four recent conferences featured focused ultrasound presentations.
- Use the links below to access meeting programs and abstract information.
The Spectrum Conference: Bridging Disciplines in Cancer Care
Spectrum 2026 was held January 15–17 in Miami, Florida. This multi-disciplinary interventional oncology meeting is primarily attended by general oncological surgeons and interventional radiologists. The agenda included sessions on thermal ablation and robotics, cryoablation, irreversible electroporation and histotripsy, and a hands-on workshop with all devices. The conference covered the treatment of lung disease, metastatic colorectal cancer, breast cancer, musculoskeletal tumors, hepatocellular carcinoma, cholangiocarcinoma, pancreatic cancer, prostate disease, and more.
There were three focused ultrasound presentations in the ablation session:
- Histotripsy – Spectrum of Applications by Dr. Mikhail Silk
- Histotripsy in Pancreatic Cancer by Dr. Mikhail Silk
- Video Learning: How I Do Histotripsy by Dr. Tze Wah
The concurrent urology session included two focused ultrasound presentations:
- High-Intensity Focused Ultrasound (HIFU) in Prostate by Dr. Mohammad Alghanem
- Hands-On Workshop with Step-by-Step Lecture: HIFU by Dr. Manuel Ozambela
During the step-by-step lecture, participants trained directly on Focal One’s HIFU device.
Industry participants included HistoSonics and Focal One.
North American Neuromodulation Society (NANS) 2026 Annual Meeting
The NANS Annual Meeting was held January 22–25 in Las Vegas, Nevada, with more than 5,000 clinicians, researchers, engineers, and students in attendance. On Saturday, January 24, a special session titled “Emerging Concepts in Focused Ultrasound for Neuromodulation” included six oral presentations:
- Focused Ultrasound for Blood Brain Barrier Opening and Neuromodulation by Peter Konrad, MD, PhD (WVU Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute)
- Focused Ultrasound: New Treatments for Epilepsy by Vibhor Krishna, MD (University of North Carolina Chapel Hill)
- Focused Ultrasound: New Treatments for Movement Disorders by Shayan Moosa, MD (University of Virginia)
- Focused Ultrasound Improves Spasticity After Spinal Cord Injury in Mouse Models Non-invasively and Reversibly by Joshua Chalif, MD, PhD (Brigham and Women’s Hospital)
- Focused Ultrasound Thalamotomy for Essential Tremor in Octogenarians by Suhrud Panchawagh, MD (Mayo Clinic)
- Esstim: Non-invasive Synergistic Application of Transcranial Ultrasound and tDCS for Motor Improvement in Parkinson’s Disease by Ciro Ramos-Estebanez, MD, PhD, MBA (University of Illinois Chicago)
“There were several cross-cutting themes across each of the talks,” said Dr. Moosa. “For example, focused ultrasound is maturing from lesion-based clinical applications for essential tremor and Parkinson’s disease into broader roles such as blood-brain barrier opening for drug delivery and reversible neuromodulation for neuropsychiatric disorders, epilepsy, and even spinal cord injury.”
Dr. Moosa added that technical advances in imaging, targeting, and transducer arrays, as well as the implementation of combination approaches that pair focused ultrasound with transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) or behavioral therapies, are active areas for development and commercialization.
NANS 2027 will be held January 21–24 in Las Vegas.
The Foundation thanks Dr. Moosa for assistance with this meeting report.
European Symposium on Ultrasound Contrast Imaging (Echo Contrast 2026)
The 31st European Symposium on Ultrasound Contrast Imaging, also known as the EchoContrast meeting, was held January 22-23 in Rotterdam, The Netherlands. At Echo Contrast, approximately 200 researchers share the latest developments on the use of imaging contrast agents for imaging, treatment, drug delivery, and other innovative applications. This year’s meeting included 16 presentations that may be of interest to the focused ultrasound community, including a keynote lecture on sonobiopsy by Hong Chen, PhD, professor of Biomedical Engineering and Neurosurgery at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri (a Focused Ultrasound Center of Excellence).
“Dr. Chen’s keynote presentation was impressive,” said Chrit Moonen, PhD, the Foundation’s co-director of the Research and Education Team, who attended the meeting. “I was especially impressed with the way that she organizes her research to quickly be able to translate her findings to human clinical use.”
“Another highlight for me was seeing the ultrasound localization methods that are producing very high-resolution 3D and 4D imaging,” said Dr. Moonen. “What that means for us – beyond neurosurgery – remains to be seen, but I can see its utility for focused ultrasound guidance.”
Each focused ultrasound presentation from Echo Contrast 2026 is listed below:
Keynote Lecture (1)
- Sonobiopsy: A Journey from Bench to Bedside by Hong Chen
Invited Lectures (2)
- Drug Delivery to the Brain: Cellular and Therapeutic Effects of Ultrasound and Microbubbles Microscopy by Sophie Morse
- Ultrasound-Mediated Delivery of Drug to Tumors by Catharina de Lange Davies
Oral Presentations (10)
- And Then There Were None? … Unravelling the Mechanisms of Sonodynamic Therapy by James McLeod, Jovana Katrinka, Luca Bau, Alexandra Vasilyeva, Estelle Beguin, Kritika Singh, Richard Lane, Niclas Westerberg, Anthony McHale, John Callan, Adam Sedgwick, Daniele Faccio, and Eleanor Stride
- Bactericidal Effect of Ultrasound-Mediated Low Concentration Antimicrobial Treatment on a Multi-Species Oral Infection Model by D. De Grandi, B. Gottenbos, M. Born, M. Stoffel, D. Carugo, and E. Stride
- Capillary Model for Ultrasound-Triggered Local Drug Delivery by Annemarie Linnenbank, Hermen de Roo, Michel Versluis, and Guillaume Lajoinie
- Measurement of Ultrasound-Responsive Microbubble Perfusion During Non-Union Bone Fracture Healing by Meng Chen Michelle Li, Dariusz Kosk, Janos Kanczler, Dario Carugo, Eleanor Stride, and Nick Evans
- Microbubble Cavitation Induces Ca2+ Influx via Mechano-Sensitive Channels Leading to Activation of eNOS Signaling and Transient Gene Expression Changes by Flordeliza Villanueva
- Sorted Mono-Sized Microbubbles for Blood-Brain Barrier Opening and 3D Super-Resolution Ultrasound Imaging by Shusei Kawara, Jingwen Zhu, Meng-Xing Tang, Sam Au, and James Choi
- Therapeutic Ultrasound-Mediated In Situ Generation of Reactive Oxygen Species for Targeted Prodrug Activation by J. Katrinka Mavrak, L. Bau, A. Sedgwick, and E. Stride
- Turning Up the Heat: Microbubbles as Powerful Amplifiers of HIFU Energy by Kaleb S. Vuong, Chelsea Hu, and Mike Averkiou
- Ultrasound Contrast Agent Detection is Enhanced Using Chirp-Coded Subharmonic Excitation and Volterra Filtering by Ruchika Dhawan, Vishwas Trivedi, Halak Shukla, Karla P. Mercado- Shekhar, Kenneth B. Bader, and Himanshu Shekhar
- Ultrasound-Mediated Delivery of Doxorubicin in Tumors: Impact of Drug Formulation and Mechanical Index by Veronica Nordlund, Sofie Snipstad, Sigrid Berg, Håkon F. Wesche, Caroline Einen Skjervold, Anniken M. Sjødal, and Catharina d. L. Davies
Posters (3)
- A6) Formulation of Cationic Microbubbles combined with Focused Ultrasound for Blood-Brain Barrier Opening and Targeted Gene Delivery in the Brain by Julie Schlederer, Thomas Ador, Claire Mackowiak, Sophie Tran, Maryvonne Ardourel, Chantal Pichon, and Anthony Delalande
- A9) Ultrasound Image Segmentation of Histotripsy Ablation Using DeepLabV3 with Combined Dice-Focal Loss by Shreyans Jain, Soham Gaonkar, Aditya Borate, Ruchika Dhawan, Kenneth B. Bader, and Himanshu Shekhar
- B5) Generation of Cavitation in the Human Pancreas Using Focused Ultrasound Coupled with Contrast Agents: Proof of Concept on Perfused Anatomical Models by A. Rohfritsch, B. Beye, J. Gannon, A. Drainville, M. Simmoneau, M. Lafond, G. Bibaki, G. Renault, J. Woodacre, E. Vlaisavljevich, F. Prat, and C. Lafon
Verasonics was one of the sponsors of this meeting.
Inaugural NDS Bioresource Symposium
On January 29, 2026, the Nuffield Department of Surgical Sciences (NDS), in association with the University of Oxford, a focused ultrasound center of excellence, held an inaugural Bioresource Symposium. To highlight the NDS Bioresource Programme, which has created a single point for researchers to access and use multiple biobanks, the symposium featured talks from academic and clinical researchers who have used its tissues and services over the years.
Professor Joakim Lundeberg from SciLifeLab gave the annual Burdette Lecture, entitled “Molecular Portraits of Morphology in Tissue Sections.” With about 60 attendees coming and going throughout the day, researchers, pathologists, and clinicians also learned about many ongoing projects, including two that are using high-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU).
- Richard Bryant, professor of urology and the academic director of NDS Surgical Intervention Trials Unit, presented an update on a randomized controlled trial of partial prostate ablation versus radical treatment. The head-to-head study is comparing not just HIFU – but also another partial treatment called irreversible electroporation – with radical treatment. The clinical trial will enroll over 300 participants across more than 10 sites, and enrollment is currently about halfway complete. This research study is important in the UK because more robust evidence is needed to expand regulatory guidance and support increased adoption of focal therapies for prostate cancer.
- Keaton Jones, a consultant surgeon and senior clinical researcher at the University of Oxford, presented data from his recent Phase I clinical trial using HIFU to ablate unresectable pancreatic cancer. The primary endpoints were met, and those data will soon be submitted for publication. The Focused Ultrasound Foundation provided add-on funding to analyze the immune response, and those analyses are currently underway. Dr. Jones is now in the planning stages for a Phase II trial to enroll 80 participants with borderline resectable pancreatic cancer.
“It is always fascinating to hear from focused ultrasound research teams firsthand and gain an understanding of how everyone plays their part in moving research forward – including investigators, funders and study nurses, whose role in driving recruitment was showcased on the day,” said Helen Laurence, the UK Focused Ultrasound Foundation’s director of Development and Strategic Impact. “We look forward to hearing more on Oxford’s Phase II research in pancreatic cancer as these plans continue to take shape.”