Dynamic response to heat--a novel physical characteristic of breast cancer

We report a novel observation about breast cancer. We imaged 6 fresh pathological specimens of breast cancer (1 mastectomy and 5 lumpectomies) with a sensitive infrared camera. We found that, following exposure to hot air for 1min, the cancers warmed up much less than the surrounding normal breast with a difference ranging from 12 to 20 degrees C. We believe that this physical property of cancer should be explored and may give us better insight into the nature of cancer, its diagnosis (including intraoperative diagnosis) and targeted treatment.