Testbed and Experiments for Focused Microwave Thermotherapy

In this paper, a testbed of a MW focusing system for non-invasive thermotherapy is presented. The proposed system provides a thermal dose at localized and deep-seated tissue for musculoskeletal disorder treatment applications. The proposed system operating at 915 MHz consist of 16 channel array antennas, a cylindrical shaped imaging tank which is filled with distilled water and a high power microwave transmitter. For focus at the targeted position, time-reversal technique is employed to find exiting parameters in proposed system. To verify the proposed system, experimental results to focus at targeted location in tissue-mimicking gelatin phantom is shown.

Thermotherapy is a medical treatment based on the specific lesion exposure to high temperature. In the case of therapeutic levels of hyperthermia, moderately elevated temperature to a supra-physiological level (typically provides effect of cellular cytotoxicity that causes tumor necrosis. For many musculoskeletal disorders, the moderately elevated temperature could be useful for the treatment of pathology. The mild thermotherapy provides physiological benefits as increasing blood flow and pain relief [1].