Reduced Graphene Oxide UWB Array Sensor: High Performance for Brain Tumor Imaging and Detection.

Area of Science:

• Biomedical Engineering
• Materials Science
• Electromagnetics

Background:

• Brain tumor detection remains a critical challenge in medical diagnostics.
• Existing microwave imaging techniques require high-performance, cost-effective sensors.
• Reduced graphene oxide (RGO) offers unique properties for sensor development.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and evaluate a low-cost, high-performance RGO Ultra-wide Band (UWB) array sensor for brain tumor detection.
• To integrate the RGO UWB sensor with confocal radar-based microwave imaging for enhanced diagnostic capabilities.
• To validate the sensor's performance using a human head phantom.

Main Methods:

• Fabrication of an RGO array sensor on a Taconic substrate operating in the 1.2 to 10.8 GHz UWB frequency range.
• Utilizing confocal radar-based microwave imaging with an improved delay-and-sum algorithm in MATLAB.
• Scanning a multi-layered human head phantom (skin, fat, skull, brain) at nine points to detect simulated tumors.

Main Results:

• The RGO UWB sensor exhibited a high gain of 5.2 to 14.5 dB and a compact size (90 mm × 45 mm²).
• The developed microwave imaging system successfully differentiated between the presence and absence of a tumor in the phantom.
• Tumor detection achieved an accuracy with an error margin of less than 2 cm.

Conclusions:

• The presented RGO UWB array sensor is a viable, low-cost, high-performance solution for brain tumor detection via microwave imaging.
• The sensor's small size and high gain facilitate integration into advanced medical imaging systems.
• This technology shows significant potential for improving the accuracy and accessibility of brain tumor diagnostics.