We present a new wide-aperture, line-focused ultrasonic material characterization system. The foci of the transmitting and receiving transducers are located in the specimen-immersion liquid interface; and the output voltage V(x, t) of the system is recorded as a function of the lateral position of the receiving transducer. The two-dimensional spectrum of V(x, t) can be expressed as a product of the transfer function of the system and the reflectance function of the interface. In comparison with a system based on scanning in the z direction, the angular resolution of the proposed technique increases with decreasing angle of incidence. There are no geometrical restrictions on the length of the recorded spatial data and the angle of incidence in the case of lateral scanning. The temperature coefficient of the measurement error is low because of the constancy of the propagation distance of ultrasound in the immersion fluid during data acquisition.

In this report, we propose a new polyborate fragment synthesis strategy along the whole chain of the polysaccharide hyaluronic acid (HA) to produce boron neutron capture therapy (BNCT) compounds. Under high pressure and deformatory solid-state conditions, polymolecular system formation takes place due to association of phase-specific transition components into a more or less distinct microscopic organization. Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy shows that HA and polyborates form a network of cyclic polychelate complexes. HA acts as a multidentate ligand using carboxylic and hydroxyl proton donor groups to link oxygen atoms in B–O–B bonds and borate-anions B–O(−): O–H···O, O–H···(−)O. With free electron pairs in heteroatoms –O(:)···B, –N(:)···B, HA can act simultaneously as an electron donor. Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) with ¹³C and ¹H reveals a preserved complex interaction after both solubilizing and attenuating the HA-polyborate system. Stability of the product in water, low cost, ease of synthesis and scalability of manufacturing indicate that HA-polyborate complexes might have advantages over current chemotherapeutic approaches in creating therapeutic agents for BNCT.

We suggest a new method for determining the longitudinal and transverse acoustic wave velocities and sample thicknesses, which is based on the measurement and analysis of pulsed echo signals by an array of ultrasonic transducers. Analytical expressions relating the delay of signals detected by the array and the values of parameters to be determined are obtained within the framework of a ray model of the measuring system. Measurements on a reference sample have been performed. The values of ultrasonic wave velocities and sample thickness obtained using the proposed technique agree with the results of measurements using independent methods.