Phantoms for elastography

Several viscoelastic properties of gelatin materials used in sonography and elastography phantoms are reported. Also reported is a device that was designed and built to make these measurements. Measurement precision with this device is typically within 1%. Finite element analysis was used to study boundary conditions and compressor size (compared to sample size) effects on the estimated elastic modulus. Results of these measurements indicate that gelatin gels are a good choice for elastography phantoms, but that the stiffness of these materials increases with time.