Integrated SFCW Transceivers for UWB Breast Cancer Imaging: Architectures and Circuit Constraints

Bassi, Matteo; Bevilacqua, Andrea; Gerosa, A.; Neviani, A.

doi:10.1109/tcsi.2011.2173400

Cited by 28 publications

(22 citation statements)

References 34 publications

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“…Or as metal/conductor detection for land-mines, re-bars in concrete or archaeological surveys. The same Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) imaging techniques can also be applied to the human body, for breastcancer detection [BBGN12] and even brain-imaging [TKL16,LNLC15].…”

Section: Applicationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

UWB waveform generator for digital CMOS radar

Bjorndal

Hamran

Lande³

2015

2015 IEEE International Symposium on Circuits and Systems (ISCAS)

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Small, low cost, radar systems have exciting applications in monitoring and imaging for the industrial, healthcare and Internet of Things (IoT) sectors. We here explore, and show the feasibility of, several single bit square wave radar architectures; that benefits from the continuous improvement in digital technologies for system-on-chip digital integration. By analysis, simulation and measurements we explore novel and harmonic-rich continuous wave (CW), stepped-frequency CW (SFCW) and frequency-modulated CW (FMCW) architectures, where harmonics can not only be suppressed but even utilized for improvements in down-range resolution without increasing on airbandwidth. In addition, due to the flexible digital CMOS implementation, the system is proved by measurement, to feasibly implement pseudo-random noise-sequence and pulsed radars, simply by swapping out the digital baseband processing. Single bit quantization is explored in detail, showing the benefits of simple implementation, the feasibility of continuous time design and only slightly degraded signal quality in noisy environments compared to an idealized analog system. Several iterations of a proof-of-concept 90 nm CMOS chip is developed, achieving a time resolution of 65 ps at nominal 1.2 V supply with a novel Digital-to-Time converter architecture. In pulsed mode, the chip features programmable pulses with a minimum width of 130 ps and a time step of 65 ps. In CW mode, we can transmit arbitrary signals up to 3.8 GHz all the way down to DC. With a continuous time single bit receiver, the backscattered signal can be mixed with the on-chip XOR gate and integrated with the on-chip counters, to provide a system-on-chip CW platform.iii

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Section: Applicationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

UWB waveform generator for digital CMOS radar

Bjorndal

Hamran

Lande³

2015

2015 IEEE International Symposium on Circuits and Systems (ISCAS)

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“…Investigaciones referentes a casos de arreglos planares de antenas se tienen: 11 antenas de (Bassi et al, 2012), 17 antenas usadas por (Conceicao et al, 2009) haciendo una comparación entre ambos tipos de arreglos por (Johnson et al, 2009) y de 49 antenas por (Li et al, 2004). Para investigaciones con arreglos dispuestos en forma tridimensional se tienen: 72 antenas por (Xie et al, 2006), de 40 antenas por (Shea et.…”

Section: Introductionunclassified

Desarrollo De Un Arreglo Circular De Antenas Utilizando Herramientas De Electromagnetismo Computacional

Calderón

Pérez²,

Benavides

et al. 2014

Inf. tecnol.

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ResumenSe presenta el diseño de un arreglo circular de antenas con un difractor de geometría variable colocado en su interior. La idea es disponer de una metodología para la simulación de diversos arreglos circulares de antenas para trabajar en rangos de frecuencias no ionizantes, una limitante de los rayos X en exámenes tales como las mamografías. El arreglo es modelado utilizando herramientas del electromagnetismo computacional: 1) el método de diferencias finitas en el dominio del tiempo, para transformar las ecuaciones diferenciales de Maxwell en ecuaciones de diferencia finita y resolverlas; 2) el método de capas perfectamente acopladas, para establecer las condiciones de frontera de absorción del sistema; y 3) las condiciones de conductor eléctrico perfecto, para modelar el difractor. El algoritmo diseñado asegura que no existen reflexiones espurias que puedan afectar las lecturas de los sensores y el comportamiento electromagnético del sistema. Los resultados muestran que es factible emplear el arreglo de antenas propuesto para el desarrollo de un sistema de detección temprana de cáncer de mama operando con frecuencias no ionizantes. Palabras clave: arreglo circular de antenas, diferencias finitas, capas perfectamente acopladas, electromagnetismo computacional Development of a Circular Antenna Array using Computational Electromagnetics Tools AbstractThe design of a circular antenna array, with a variable geometry diffracting device placed in it. The idea is to develop a methodology for the simulation of circular antenna array to work in frequency non-ionizing ranges, a limitation of X ray exams such as those for early detection of breast cancer. The array is modeled using computational electromagnetics tools: 1) The method of finite differences in time domain, to transform Maxwell differential equations into finite difference equations to solve them. 2) the method of perfectly matched layers, to establish the absorbing boundary conditions of the system and 3) the conditions of perfect electrical conductor to model the diffracting device. The designed algorithm ensures that there are no spurious reflections which could affect the readings of the sensors and the electromagnetic behavior of the system. Results show that the proposed antenna array is suitable for the development of a system for the early detection of breast cancer working at non ionizing frequencies.

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“…Recently dedicated CMOS circuits have been proposed [26][27][28][29][30][31] to be used as the front end of RF/Microwave imaging systems. Although they are able to reduce the overall size of the frontend, the cost of development of dedicated CMOS integrated circuits is expensive and complicated.…”

Section: Background and Motivationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Various studies show that the optimal spectrum to couple electromagnetic energy into the human tissue such as the breast, brain or torso matter is less than 4 GHz [24][25], [29].…”

Section: Imaging System Designmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Design of wideband microwave frontend for microwave-based imaging systems

Marimuthu¹

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Microwave imaging has been investigated in the last few years as an attractive complement to current diagnostic tools for medical applications due to its low-cost, portability and nonionization radiation. Research to verify the feasibility of microwave imaging systems for medical applications is conducted using a Vector Network Analyser (VNA) as the microwave transceiver. The VNA is usually bulky and expensive, and thus prevents microwave imaging systems from being low-cost and portable. A necessary condition to turn microwave imaging into a mass screening diagnostic tool is to replace the VNA with a low-cost portable unit that can characterise, generate, transmit and receive signals, across a wideband with large dynamic range and stability. Tissues in the human body are lossy at microwave frequencies, and hence microwave signals undergo high attenuation when penetrating the human tissues during the process of imaging. Using a wider frequency spectrum provides better resolution, but low frequencies penetrate further into the body. As a trade-off between the required signal penetration and image resolution, microwave frequencies within the band 0.5-4 GHz have been used in many medical applications, such as head, torso, and breast imaging.Thus, the desired generic microwave transceiver for microwave-based medical imaging should cover this wide frequency band.This thesis proposes two versions of a reconfigurable low-cost portable broadband RF frontend medical imaging systems based on Software Defined Radio (SDR) and in doing so makes four contributions to the field of microwave imaging systems. The first contribution is the design of a low-cost reconfigurable microwave transceiver based on software defined radar (SDRadar). A RF broadband circulator used to separate the transmitted and received signal and a virtual ultra-wideband (UWB) time domain pulse is generated by coherently adding multiple frequency spectrums together. To verify the proposed SDRadar system for medical imaging, experiments were conducted using a circular scanning system and directional antenna. An image reconstruction algorithm used to generate and verify the images of the target embedded in a phantom developed with liquid emulating the average properties of different human tissues using the measurement data. The system successfully detects and localise small targets at different locations in the phantom.The above broadband circulator, however, limited the isolation between the transmitted and received signal, and the system lacked a calibration process. Hence, the proposed system is unable to image more complex human tissues.iii The second contribution of the thesis is the design of Vector Network Analyzer (VNA) by using the above SDR called Software defined VNA (SDVNA) with a highly directive broadband directional coupler (0.5-4 GHz). However, using a directional coupler with a single-receiver single-transmitter the conventional open/short/match/thru calibration technique is not applicable, and thus, it is re-developed to take into ac...

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Integrated SFCW Transceivers for UWB Breast Cancer Imaging: Architectures and Circuit Constraints

Cited by 28 publications

References 34 publications

UWB waveform generator for digital CMOS radar

UWB waveform generator for digital CMOS radar

Desarrollo De Un Arreglo Circular De Antenas Utilizando Herramientas De Electromagnetismo Computacional

Design of wideband microwave frontend for microwave-based imaging systems

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