Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease is the accumulation of triglycerides in liver. In its malignant form, it can proceed to steatohepatitis, fibrosis, cirrhosis, cancer and ultimately liver impairment, leading to liver transplantation. In a previous study, ultrasound-induced thermal strain imaging (US-TSI) was used to distinguish between excised fatty livers from obese mice and non-fatty livers from control mice. In this study, US-TSI was used to quantify lipid composition of fatty livers in ob/ob mice (n = 28) at various steatosis stages. A strong correlation coefficient was observed (R² = 0.85) between lipid composition measured with US-TSI and hepatic triglyceride content. Hepatic triglyceride content is used to quantify adipose tissue in liver. The ob/ob mice were divided into three groups based on the degree of steatosis that is used in clinics: none, mild and moderate. A non-parametric Kruskal-Wallis test was conducted to determine if US-TSI can potentially differentiate among the steatosis grades in non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.

非酒精性脂肪性肝病是甘油三酯在肝脏中的积累。在其恶性形式中，它可以发展为脂肪性肝炎、纤维化、肝硬化、癌症并最终导致肝损伤，从而导致肝移植。在之前的一项研究中，超声诱导的热应变成像 (US-TSI) 用于区分来自肥胖小鼠的切除脂肪肝和来自对照小鼠的非脂肪肝。在本研究中，US-TSI 用于量化不同脂肪变性阶段 ob/ob 小鼠 (n = 28) 中脂肪肝的脂质组成。观察到强相关系数（R ² = 0.85) 在用 US-TSI 测量的脂质成分和肝脏甘油三酯含量之间。肝脏甘油三酯含量用于量化肝脏中的脂肪组织。ob/ob 小鼠根据临床使用的脂肪变性程度分为三组：无、轻度和中度。进行了非参数 Kruskal-Wallis 测试以确定 US-TSI 是否可以潜在地区分非酒精性脂肪肝疾病的脂肪变性等级。