Thanks to new software from two South Dakota State University computer science professors, female wellness may soon be improved with a more accurate and less expensive way to detect breast cancer.
According to professor Sung Shin, the new breast imaging technology, known as microwave tomography imaging (MTI), can produce an image that is even capable of finding cancer in women with dense breast tissue, and it can be done at a fraction of the cost of current techniques. During an MTI, you simply lie on a special table with your breast in a compartment filled with gel, and then the technician takes the image.
This project has been in development since 2010, with Shin and assistant professor Wei Wang working with scientists from The Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute and Chung Nam University in Daejeon, South Korea. The institute in South Korea is owned by the government, and holds the patent on the microwave tomography machine. Shin explained that it is here that the MTI is being developed as a cancer screening tool.
The first 15 patients were screened using this experimental procedure last autumn, which involved using MTI, magnetic resonance imaging— or MRI—and mammography. Dr. Wu-Kyung Moon of Seoul National University, a medical doctor and one of South Korea’s leading cancer researchers, is working with Shin on this portion of the international collaborative project. Since Shin returned from Korea in January with the imaging data, Wang has said ‘We have rich information now.’
So how does the MTI work? The software that the team is developing will be able to identify the tumour on the MTI and then compare it to a database of more than 100,000 MRI images, choosing the cases that are most similar and extracting the image along with the case files, Wang said. From this, doctors will be able to see what treatments were used, how successful they were at combating the cancer, and how to then proceed with a plan of action for the patient in question.
According to Shin, the process is dependent on the quality of image that the machine produces. Wang explained that the imaging machine currently uses a wave frequency of three gigahertz, ‘which gives the patient exposure to less radiation than using a cell phone,’ but the team is now upgrading the machine to six gigahertz because ‘higher frequency will give a better image.’ Shin and Wang hope future funding will involve partnering with an American health-care facility, and that their work will be completed by 2015.
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