Bone Phantoms for the observation of the fast and slow waves

Working with bone mimicking phantoms is necessary for the development of ultrasonic methods for bone characterization. The phantoms currently available for trabecular bone do not mimic some of the bone ultrasonic properties accurately. We report the fabrication of anisotropic phantoms, constituted of square rods, using a modified stereolithographic printer. Ultrasound pulse propagation was performed in the phantoms and the fast and slow waves could be observed for a propagation along the main orientation of the rods. This work demonstrates the feasibility of printing anisotropic structures with a typical size comparable to the size of bone trabeculae. Further work will be directed towards high resolution printing of full trabecular micro-structures.