Characterizing Horn Antenna Signals for Breast Cancer Detection

An in-depth analysis of signals from horn antennas used in breast cancer detection research has been carried out. It was found that following the excitation signal, both the double-ridged and the quad-ridged ultra-wideband horn antennas radiate additional unwanted signals that persistently oscillate. Undesirable signal oscillations sources were identified as the horn antenna cavity resonance and inherent antenna LC resonance. These signals interfere with the tumor’s signal response and need to be eliminated for successful detection of the cancerous growth. This paper proposes solutions to remove or minimize these signals without affecting antenna parameters such as bandwidth, gain, ports isolation, and polarization isolation. Modification of the antenna cavity successfully suppressed the unwanted cavity oscillation. Modification of the antenna waveguide reduced inductance and consequently mitigated LC oscillation. The resulting time and frequency domain horn antenna signals demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed methods. Finally, a breast phantom with a tumor is simulated using signals from the original and a modified horn antenna. The delay and sum method is used to create images. The breast images demonstrate enhanced image quality through the reduction of clutter using the proposed techniques. The signal-to-clutter ratios are 0.448 and 1.6823 dB for the images produced by using the original and modified antennas, respectively.