IntraVascular UltraSound (IVUS) is an exploratory technique used in interventional procedures that allows 2D cross section artery anatomy image, providing qualitative information about the causes and severity of the narrowing of the arterial lumen. Its importance is due not only to cross section visibility but also to the possibility of visualizing plaque extension of a vessel segment during the catheter imaging pullback. At the moment, this kind of analysis is carried out manually by physicians without taking into account the ultrasonic signal principles of the image grey level generation. This fact leads to a simplified use, and an inefficient interpretation of the IVUS images. Medical expert and computer vision researchers can use this book to learn the concepts that allow to understand the origin of the images, researchers and doctors can use it to learn and to compare the influence of different physical parameters in the IVUS image formation. The author provides in this book a new possibility that allows to give new potential to the IVUS technique as an exploratory and medical diagnostic tools.

Misael Rosales, is a teaching professor of physics at the Universidad de los Andes Mérida-Venezuela. MS in Medical Imaging at Computer Vision Center and phD degree on Informatics at the Universitat Autonoma of Barcelona/Spain. Her present research is concentrated on IVUS and high energy photons from Gamma Ray Bursts.