MICROWAVE RADAR-

BASED DIFFERENTIAL
BREAST CANCER
IMAGING

Guided By Presented By
Mrs. Preetha Basu PRIBIN CHACKO
T7
7941
ABSTRACT
An improved antenna is presented for radar-based breast
cancer imaging. The improvement was achieved by increasing
the number of antennas in the array to 31 elements, as well as by
improving the antenna design itself. Using an experimental
setup, with homogeneous curved breast phantoms, we have
demonstrated substantial imaging improvement with the new
antenna array. The new system is also able to detect 7mm-
diameter tumour phantoms in any location within the breast,
even as close as 4mm from the skin layer. Additionally, we have
shown good imaging results in low contrast scenarios, where the
dielectric contrast between tumour and normal tissue was
reduced to 2:1. Presented results clearly demonstrate the large
impact of antenna’s characteristics on imaging performance.

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CONTENTS
 INTRODUCTION
 UWB ANTENNA DESIGN
 ANTENNA ARRAY DESIGN
 3D RADAR IMAGING SETUP
a. Measurement setup
b. 3D breast phantom
c. Differential imaging and focusing algorithm
 3D IMAGING RESULTS
 Comparison with previous antenna array
 Location-independent imaging using the new antenna array
 Low-contrast imaging using new antenna array
 CONCLUSIONS 3
 INTRODUCTION
 Breast cancer is cancer originating breast from tissues.
 Most commonly found in middle-aged womens.

 This paper discusses an application of microwaves for medical

imaging (for cancer detection).
 Two main approaches to microwave breast imaging:

 Microwave tomography and

 Radar-based imaging

 Radar based imaging technique is applied in the proposed

method.

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PRINCIPLE
 The cancer detection is based on a difference in the electrical
properties of normal and malignant breast tissues
 The early work on breast cancer detection was based on the
assumptions of
1. High (about 5:1) dielectric contrast, as well as
2. Relatively homogeneous (electrically) internal breast
structure
 The most recent studies indicates that that the contrast might
be significantly lower, and also that the breast interior is more
inhomogeneous than previously assumed.
 So breast imaging is much more challenging than previously
thought
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PRINCIPLE (CONTD…)
 Breast phantoms are developed from the MRI scanning
images of the breast.
 The breast electrical properties differ at the same level as
pixel intensity of MRI images.
 The more challenging process is to build a real breast
phantom with the same tissue complexity as in numerical
MRI-based phantoms.
 All experimental phantoms reported so far assume
homogeneous breast tissue and only some include the very
important skin layer.
 In this paper a new antenna array with 31 elements is
presented, designed for microwave radar-based breast
imaging. 6
PRINCIPLE (CONTD…)

 System is based on multi-static radar operation

 Previous prototype used a 16-antenna array, formed on a
section of a hemi-sphere to conform well to the breast shape.
 Here the no. of antenna is increased and antenna design is
improved.

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UWB ANTENNA DESIGN
 A new improved antenna is selected.
 Here we use UWB-Ultra Wide Band antenna.

 The main advantages of wide-slot UWB antenna are

a. low-profile and excellent transient characteristics for a

wide range of radiation angles.
 The main advantages of the new design are

 stable radiation pattern across the frequency band of

interest.
 extremely high fidelity (>95%) of radiated pulses for
radiation angles even up to 600 from bore-sight.

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 ANTENNA ARRAY DESIGN

A. Old Array
 The old antenna array
design is modified for
improving the performance
 The old array contain only
16 antennas
 Arranged on a section of a
hemi-sphere to conform
well to the breast shape.

Old prototype: 16-element array based

on the stacked-patch antenna 9
ANTENNA ARRAY DESIGN (CONTD…)
B. New Array

 New antenna array is formed

around the lower part of a
85mm-radius sphere
 3D CAD software is used for
the new array design.
 To provide the best radiation
coverage of a breast, all
antennas were positioned to
point towards a centre of
curvature.
 A plastic shell, with openings
for the antennas, has been
manufactured to assure the best
possible accuracy of New prototype: 31-element array based on
positioning antennas the wide-slot antenna. 10
ANTENNA ARRAY DESIGN (CONTD…)

Schematic of the array modelled using CAD software

11
ANTENNA ARRAY DESIGN (CONTD…)

Low loss ceramic matching shell and inserts 12

(Eccostock HiK500F).
3D RADAR IMAGING SETUP
A. IMAGING SETUP
 The array is connected with coaxial cables to a custom-built
network of electromechanical switches
 The bank of switches selects all possible pairs of antennas
within the array, and connects them in turn to a vector network
analyser (VNA)
 The VNA performs the radar measurement in the frequency-
domain
 In a post-reception step, all measured data is transformed into
the time-domain.
 With thirty one antenna elements in the array, four hundred and
sixty five independent measurements (multistatic radar signals)
are recorded. 13
IMAGING SETUP (CONTD…)
 A computer controls both the VNA and the switch bank
 The measurement takes about 80 seconds to complete.

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IMAGING SETUP (CONTD…)

15
Experimental setup of our imaging system.
3D BREAST PHANTOM
 For experimental testing a 3D model of the breast is
developed.
 during measurements the antennas are immersed in a
matching liquid, to reduce reflections from the skin and
for a more compact antenna design.
 The matching liquid must be able to simulate the
properties of normal breast-fat.
 The matching and normal breast tissue equivalent liquid
has a relative dielectric constant of about 10 and an
attenuation of 1.2 dB/cm at 6GHz. This material is also
dispersive.
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ALTERNATIVE FOR MATCHING LIQUID

 As an alternative to the lossy matching liquid we can use a

ceramic shell to fill the distance between antennas and a breast
skin.
 A 1mm thin layer of matching liquid still needs to be used
between antennas and the ceramic shell.
 To accommodate breasts of different size, ceramic insert shells
are used.
 The ceramic matching shell and inserts are designed, using low
loss material with controlled dielectric constant (εr=10) material
Eccostock HiK500F from Emerson&Cuming.

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 DEVELOPMENT OF SKIN PHANTOM

 The skin layer is 2mm thick, it is a part of a 67mm-radius

hemi-sphere.
 When the skin phantom is fitted into the array it lies 20mm
above antenna elements. This distance between antennas and
breast provides a full coverage of a breast by an antenna
radiation pattern.
 The skin layer material is dispersive and, at 6 GHz, it has a
relative dielectric constant of 30 and attenuation of 16 dB/cm.

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CONSTRUCTION OF TUMOR PHANTOM

 Tumour phantom is constructed from a material with a

relative dielectric constant close to 50.
 Conductivity of the material is 7 S/m (at 6GHz).

 The contrast between dielectric properties of breast fat and

tumour phantom materials is around 1:5.
Recently published data on the electromagnetic (EM)
properties of breast tissues suggest that the contrast might
be significantly lower, and also that the breast interior is
more inhomogeneous than previously thought

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DIFFERENTIAL IMAGING
 To obtain tumour response from the measured data we
perform two measurements by rotating the array
 This method provides a differential signal, which is used
as an input into focusing algorithm.
 Advantage of this differential imaging is that it does not
require a background measurement.
 Thus it could be used in realistic scenarios with breast
cancer patients.

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FOCUSING ALGORITHM
 A modified delay and sum (DAS) algorithm is used to
form 3D images of scattered energy.
 The scattered energy at the given focal point, within the
breast volume, can be expressed as:

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FOCUSING ALGORITHM (CONTD…)

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FOCUSING ALGORITHM (CONTD…)

 Constants CTXant and CRXant were introduced to account for real

antennas’ effects and they are defined as:

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FOCUSING ALGORITHM (CONTD…)

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3D IMAGING RESULTS
 Comparison with previous antenna array
 A 10mm (diameter) tumour phantom, located at a position
P(x=20, y=20, z=-20) is considered. In both cases we have used
breast phantom as described earlier
 Phantom used with the 31-elements array had 9mm bigger
radius (skin had r=67mm,for 16 element array r=58mm only.)
 16-element array was slightly smaller due to the fact that the
whole array was formed as a part of sphere with radius 78mm,
and the radius of the 31-element array was 85mm.

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COMPARISON (CONTD…)
• To quantitatively assess imaging results, we introduce a measure
of detection quality: ratio of the clutter energy to the tumour
energy, above a certain threshold t (C/Tt).
• The clutter energy is calculated within the entire 3-D image
(hemi-sphere with 67mm radius), and is simply the sum of
focused values exceeding threshold t in all pixels.
• The tumour energy is calculated as the sum of focused values
above the threshold, for pixels located within a cube of
24x24x24mm3, with the maximum focused signal located in the
centre of the cube.(volume where we calculate the clutter is about forty
five times larger than that of the tumour)
• Another measure for quantitative assessment of imaging results
is a ratio of peak clutter energy to a peak tumour energy
(peakC/T ), calculated within a full 3D image volume.
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COMPARISON (CONTD…) 3D IMAGES

27
COMPARISON (CONTD…)

 Looking at figures for the 16-

element and the 31-elements
arrays we can see that in both
cases tumour has been
detected.
 A single artifact is also visible
for the 16-element array.
? HOW THE FIGURES ARE
PLOT ?
 3D images are shown as
contour plots at -1.5dB cut-off
(all values smaller than -1.5dB
of a maximum value are not
shown).
COMPARISON (CONTD…)

29
COMPARISON (CONTD…) 2D IMAGES

30
COMPARISON (CONTD…)

31
COMPARISON (CONTD…)

32
COMPARISON (CONTD…)

33
COMPARISON (CONTD…)

34
COMPARISON (CONTD…)

 Use only sixteen antenna for focusing with new array with
the positions closest to those from the old array

Same as old figure

35
COMPARISON (CONTD…)

 As expected, there is more clutter in the image

 But these results are still significantly better than for the old
array with the same number of antennas.

Old array New array 36

COMPARISON (CONTD…)

 The above results let us finally draw a conclusion that the

superior imaging performance is due to

a. The better antenna design, and

b. The larger number of antennas, which provides
larger array aperture and higher diversity of the
radar data.

c. This is encouraging and suggest that an improvement

could still be achieved by further working on the better
antenna and by adding more antennas to the array.
37
LOCATION-INDEPENDENT IMAGING
USING THE NEW ANTENNA ARRAY
 A malignant tissue can be located anywhere within a
breast.
 So investigations are done at several locations of the
breast.
 3 locations are picked within +x/+y quadrant (due to
symmetry of the array). They are
1. P1 (x=0,y=50,z=-30),
2. P2 (x=50,y=0,z=-30),
3. P3 (x=40,y=40,z=-30).
 All three positions represent challenging cases of
tumours in a close proximity of the skin layer. Any other
locations further away from a skin are easier to detect 38
RESULTS

39
LOCATION-INDEPENDENT IMAGING
(CONTD…)

40
LOW-CONTRAST IMAGING USING
NEW ANTENNA ARRAY

41
LOW-CONTRAST IMAGING : RESULTS

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LOW-CONTRAST IMAGING (CONTD…)
 In all the cases the tumor detected without any problems.
 However, as the dielectric contrast decreases, clutter increases.
 The obtained peak C/T values are
 0.36 for a 5:1 contrast,
 0.54 for a 2.7:1 contrast, and
 0.69 for a 2:1 contrast.
 This gives almost 100% increase in peak C/T value, when
dielectric contrast decreases from 5:1 to 2:1.
 However, it does not prohibit successful detection.
 These results confirm that
 The lower dielectric contrast imposes additional challenges for
microwave imaging modalities 43
CONCLUSIONS
 This paper presents the new improved antenna array for radar-based
breast cancer imaging.
 Improvement was achieved by increasing the number of antennas in
the array as well as by designing new UWB antenna.
 Comparing to the previously used stacked-patch antenna, which have
a planar size of 18x23 mm2, the new wide-slot antenna has a size
14x14 mm2.
 The main advantages of the new design over the patch are
 Stable radiation pattern across a frequency band of interest
 extremely high fidelity (>95%) of radiated pulses for radiation
angles even up to 600 from bore-sight.
 significant imaging improvement with the new 31-antenna system
over the previous 16-element array

44
CONCLUSIONS (CONTD…)
 With the low threshold level (-7dB) in 3D images, the 16-
element array provided a low quality images with high
clutter. Targets often remain unrecognized.
 For the new array images consisted only of tumour
response with no artifacts.
 This is achieved by modifying the antenna design.

 The new system is able to detect 7mm diameter tumour

phantoms in any location within the breast, even as close
as 4mm from the skin layer.
 Good imaging results in low-contrast scenarios (2:1).

 To the best of my knowledge, the system presented in this

paper is the most advanced experimental system built for
microwave breast imaging. 45
 
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