Tissue characterization reflects structural and functional integrity of tissues. Inasmuch as reversible ischemia causes no structural damage and irreversible ischemia results in persistent structural myocardial damage, we postulated that ultrasonic tissue characterization can distinguish the two types of injuries. Anesthetized open chest dogs underwent 15 minutes (group 1, n = 5) and 90 minutes (group 2, n = 8) of acute total occlusion of the left anterior descending coronary artery, followed by 3 hours of reperfusion. Myocardial ischemia-infarction was confirmed with segment shortening, electronmicroscopic examination, and triphenyl tetrazolium chloride staining. Integrated backscatter Rayleigh 5 (IBR5), a measure of ultrasonic backscatter, and Fourier coefficient of amplitude modulation (FAM), an index of cardiac cycle dependent variation in backscatter, were measured at baseline, during ischemia, and after reperfusion. Group 1 (reversible ischemia) showed an increase in IBR5 from -48 +/- 1.2 dB at control to -45 +/- 1.0 dB (p less than 0.01) during ischemia, which returned to baseline after reperfusion (-47 +/- 1.3 dB). FAM was blunted during ischemia (6.2 +/- 1.0 dB during control versus 1.2 +/- 1.0 dB during ischemia, p less than 0.01) and recovered completely during reperfusion. Segment shortening was abolished during ischemia (18% +/- 3% during control versus -12% +/- 5% during ischemia, p less than 0.01) and recovered partially during reperfusion (4% +/- 5%). The group 2 animals with irreversible myocardial injury showed an increase in IBR5, from -49 +/- 1.2 dB during control to -44 +/- 1.0 dB during ischemia (p less than 0.01) and paradoxical bulging of the ischemic region (17% +/- 3% to -7% +/- 3%, p less than 0.01) during ischemia.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)