Performance Evaluation of Focused Microwave Brain Hyperthermia Guided by Microwave-Induced Thermoacoustic Tomography

Microwave hyperthermia of brain tumors using an antenna array is a novel noninvasive and accurate treatment method. This work evaluates the performance of focused microwave brain hyperthermia guided by microwave-induced thermoacoustic tomography (FMBH-MITAT). An applicator with 17 antennas working at 1.3 GHz specifically for FMBH-MITAT is designed and a realistic human head phantom with a tumor is used. EM and EM-thermal simulations with different tumor cases are conducted to obtain the field distribution, specific absorption rate distribution and temperature distribution in the entire head. These factors can evaluate the performance of the technique for dealing with different tumors. We investigate how well the microwave field is focusing, how much power is demanded in a practical system, if the temperature in the tumor is high enough to do the hyperthermia and if the hyperthermia hurts the normal brain tissues. The obtained results demonstrate that the FMBH-MITAT technique can efficiently deal with most of the tested tumors, despite that the performance for a deeply located tumor is not good. This work is very meaningful for potential development of a practical system based on FMBH-MITAT.