Cavitation dynamics and damage in soft matter

The collapse of vapor bubbles in water has long been studied and known to damage neighboring solid objects in applications ranging from naval hydrodynamics to turbomachinery. With the development of ultrasound therapies, there has been increasing interest in investigating the behavior of cavitation bubbles in soft materials, particularly in the medical context. The rheology of soft matter introduces additional physical effects (e.g., elasticity, relaxation), whose effects are not fully understood due to the complexity of the microstructure. In this presentation, we will discuss our efforts to model cavitation-bubble dynamics in soft matter and highlight some of their distinctive features, motivated by two specific applications: histotripsy (a novel ultrasound therapy to homogenize human tissue) and blast-induced traumatic brain injury.