Microwave tomographic imaging for breast cancer chemotherapy monitoring

The integrated clinical system for microwave breast cancer detection developed at Dartmouth College has been operational for several years and has allowed us to acquire data on multiple patients. Our recent efforts have concentrated on improving our post-processing algorithms as well as on utilizing the data for medical diagnosis. In this talk, we will cover both aspects, detailing how we can now generate 3D microwave images of breast tissues in several tens of minutes, and use the results for accurate monitoring of tumor progression during neoadjuvant chemotherapy. Neoadjuvant treatment is becoming more widespread because of its ability to control local tumor growth and minimize excision volume but also because it provides predictive insight into how metastases respond to systemic treatment after surgery. This is an excellent application for microwave imaging where currently the patients are poorly served by conventional modalities such as MR and PET largely because of cost and poor access.