Abstract
Techniques used for breast cancer detection usually incorporate Infrared Thermography (IRT) to locate abnormal hotspots or asymmetry in a thermal texture map. This can be unreliable due to various individual differences from one person to another. In this paper, a detection method that is independent of the aforementioned limitations is proposed. This technique is a combination of thermal imaging and high-frequency excitation. This technique is based on the fact that the differences in electromagnetic and thermal properties of abnormal (malignant) tissue and the surrounding normal tissue will result in a noticeable difference in temperature increase after exposure to high-frequency excitation. A three-dimensional (3-D) finite-element method (FEM) has been used to simulate the thermal behavior of breast tissue exposed to antenna excitations. Finally, the effectiveness of this technique was tested in a series of experiments using a life-sized breast phantom.