Marcin Lewandowski

Biography

Since receiving a master’s degree in physics followed by a Ph.D. in Electronic Engineering, Marcin Lewandowski has headed many projects in R&D, commercial product design and medical devices development and certification. He has also authored numerous publications in scientific journals on the medical and industrial applications of ultrasound. Over the course of 25+ years working in ultrasound, electronics and software development, Marcin has strived to apply his research expertise in projects with a strong potential for innovation and commercialization. Today, he balances his continued work in science with his role as CEO at us4us Ltd., who produce original ultrasound platforms for research, biomedical and industrial applications. Novel ultrasound imaging solutions and GPU implementation have formed a key part of Marcin’s work for several years. us4us products all employ software processing on GPUs for real-time access to raw ultrasound data, and garner interest from universities, research institutes and commercial clients looking for powerful, versatile and fully programmable imaging solutions.

Description of the general focus of the symposium "OpenfUS"

Functional ultrasound (fUS) imaging has emerged over the past decade as a revolutionary technology for imaging brain activity. This modality leverages the hemodynamic responses associated with neural activity, offering a high spatiotemporal resolution, sensitivity, and field of view that surpasses several imaging techniques. Despite its advancement, there is a notable absence of an integrated resource that consolidates animal surgery protocols, platform construction, data acquisition, analysis, and interpretation. The OpenfUS initiative led by the Neuro-Electronics Research Flanders in Belgium addresses this gap by offering a comprehensive resource portal centralizing this information into a unified framework. It serves as a nexus for global users of fUS technology, providing access to the cumulative expertise of field leaders. OpenfUS streamlines the end-to-end process of fUS imaging, from experimental setup to insightful analysis, facilitating a leap forward in brain research and fostering collaboration and innovation across the scientific community. During this symposium, we will elucidate the fundamental research conducted employing OpenfUS in diverse animal models, encompassing mice, cats, pigs, and primates, and explain how fUS facilitates the rapid acquisition of novel insights pertaining to brain circuits and pathologies.

Talk 

"OpenfUS: The gateway to cutting-edge brain activity mapping with functional ultrasound imaging"

Ultrasound imaging is broadly utilized in medical diagnostics and has recently been extended to specific applications in pre-clinical research on small animals — e.g. functional US (fUS) for real-time monitoring of brain activity, focused US for neuromodulation and opening of the blood-brain barrier, and more. Instrumentation for these techniques is complex and requires programmable ultrasound hardware, dedicated probes, and advanced signal processing software.

We have developed a family of research ultrasound platforms with open-source software providing support for the most popular languages: PYTHON, MATLAB, C++. Our systems can work with various probes (linear, annular, matrix) in the frequency range of 1—30MHz. Real-time access to raw RF or I/Q data, support for ultrafast acquisition, and powerful GPU processing on raw data make the platforms a versatile tool for almost any application.

Partnering with the community, we would like to develop software tools for selected pre- clinical applications. I will present a few application use-cases to prove how our platforms’ features and functions can bring value to the open-science paradigm.