Dispersive model selection and reconstruction for tissue culture ultrasonic monitoring

The evolution of relevant mechanical parameters during tissue engineering formation processes can provide useful information for their control in real-time, as well as a new dimension in the understanding of internal processes and their final quality. Since ultrasonics are mechanical waves, they are ideally well suited for probing certain mechanical properties. An ultrasound monitoring Petri dish has been designed for this purpose. The readings from the ultrasonic sensors need a detailed analysis, based on numerical models of the ultrasound-tissue interaction, and a stochastic treatment, in order to extract the relevant information and its evolution with sufficient sensitivity. In addition, a stochastic model-class selection formulation is used to rank which one of the proposed interaction models are more plausible. To verify the sensitivity of the system, a gelation process is monitored.