Investigation of tumour detection using contrast agents and FEM-CSI in biomedical microwave tomography

A finite element contrast source inversion algorithm was used to invert synthetic contrast enhanced breast data in order to determine the location of tumours. Prior information about the anatomy and the electrical properties of the breast model, which is obtained by a blind inversion before adding the contrast agent, is incorporated in order to increase the likelihood of successfully locating the tumours. Simulating the use of a contrast agent by increasing the permittivity of the tumours allows for a positive detection of their position. This method was also applied to data obtained from a numerical human forearm phantom in order to show applicability to anatomical regions with varying homogeneity.