Microwave‐induced thermoacoustic scanning CT for high‐contrast and noninvasive breast cancer imaging

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Abstract
A fast thermoacoustic computed tomography system with a multielement linear transducer array was developed to image biological tissues with circular scanning. The spatial resolution of the imaging system and the spectra of the thermoacoustic signals were analyzed. A modified integration backprojection algorithm using velocity potential was employed to recover the direct energy deposition distribution, signal processing methods, and reconstruction algorithms were validated by imaging a phantom. The differences of the microwave‐frequency dielectric properties between malignant and normal adipose‐dominated tissues in the breast are considerable, and the absorption contrast can reach as large as 6:1 at . An experiment of human breast tissue with a tumor was performed with this system; the thermoacoustic images reconstructed by a limited‐field‐filtered backprojection algorithm and a modified integration backprojection algorithm were also compared with a mammogram. Our results show that the system can provide a rapid and noninvasive approach for high‐contrast breast cancer imaging.
Funding Information
  • NNSFC (30470494, 30627003, 7117865)

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