In this paper, a microwave technique for breast cancer imaging is presented. The approach is based on the use of magnetic nanoparticles as contrast agent to induce a nonnull magnetic contrast selectively localized within the tumor. This allows us to face cancer imaging as the reconstruction of a magnetic contrast from the corresponding scattered field. To extract, from the measured data the contribution due to the magnetic contrast, i.e., the signal meaningful for cancer imaging, the approach exploits the possibility of modulating the magnetic response of magnetic nanoparticles by means of a polarizing magnetic field. The achievable reconstruction capabilities and the robustness against uncertainties on the electric features of the surrounding electric scenario are assessed by means of numerical examples.

This work focuses on brain stroke imaging via microwave technology. In particular, the open issue of monitoring patients after stroke onset is addressed here in order to provide clinicians with a tool to control the effectiveness of administered therapies during the follow-up period. In this paper, a novel prototype is presented and characterized. The device is based on a low-complexity architecture which makes use of a minimum number of properly positioned and designed antennas placed on a helmet. It exploits a differential imaging approach and provides 3D images of the stroke. Preliminary experiments involving a 3D phantom filled with brain tissue-mimicking liquid confirm the potential of the technology in imaging a spherical target mimicking a stroke of a radius equal to 1.25 cm.

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By exploiting the proposed criterion a study of the clinical scalability of the therapeutic approach is presented.

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Microwave imaging has been recently proposed as alternative technology for in-line inspection of packaged products in the food industry, thanks to its non-invasiveness and the low-cost of the equipment. In this framework, simple and effective detection/imaging strategies, able to reveal the presence of foreign bodies that may have contaminated the product during the packaging stage, are needed to allow real-time and reliable detection, thus avoiding delays along the production line and limiting occurrence of false detections (either negative or positive). In this work, a novel detection/imaging approach meeting these requirements is presented. The approach performs the detection/imaging of the contaminant by exploiting the symmetries usually characterizing the food items. Such symmetries are broken by the presence of foreign bodies, thereby determining a differential signal that can be processed to reveal their presence. In so doing, the approach does not require the prior measurement of a reference, defect-free, item. With respect to the quite common case of homogeneous food packaged in circular plastic/glass jars, numerical analyses are provided to show the effectiveness of the proposed approach.

The aim of this paper is to present and experimentally verify the first prototype of a microwave imaging system specifically designed and realized for the continuous monitoring of patients affected by brain stroke, immediately after its onset and diagnosis. The device is a 2D version of the 3D system, currently under construction, and consists of an array of 12 printed monopole antennas connected to a two-port vector network analyzer through a switching matrix so that each antenna can act as a transmitter or receiver, thereby allowing the acquisition of the entire multistatic multiview scattering matrix required for the imaging. The system has been experimentally tested on 2D phantoms with electric properties mimicking the brain. The presence and the evolution of the stroke have been reproduced by filling a proper cavity in the phantom with a liquid having the electric properties of blood. A differential approach has been adopted by acquiring the scattering matrix before and after the filling of the blood cavity. The so achieved differential dataset has been processed by means of a linear imaging algorithm in order to reconstruct the stroke location and dimension. Moreover, the effect of pre- and postprocessing operations on the measured data is investigated. A good agreement has been obtained between the reconstructions and the actual scenario. As a final remark, it is worth noting that the entire data acquisition and processing are sufficiently fast to allow a real-time monitoring.

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