Application of Digitized Frequency Modulated Thermal Wave Imaging for Breast Cancer Detection: A Numerical Study

Among various types of cancers, breast cancer is known to be the second most widespread cancer, with a higher susceptibility rate for women which makes it a highly concerning health issue for developed as well as developing nations. Currently, there are different invasive (biopsy) and non-invasive diagnostic techniques used for the detection of breast cancer. Out of all the different methodologies, the most widely used are non-invasive techniques such as mammography, ultrasonic imaging, and magnetic resonance imaging. However, these techniques bear certain limitations which include: utilizing ionization radiation, involving patient discomfort, higher equipment cost and early diagnostics is not possible. So, to overcome these limitations associated with the conventional methodological approaches for diagnosing breast cancer at early stages, active infrared thermographic techniques have been introduced. These techniques are relatively noncontact, noninvasive, non-ionizing, the whole field, and patient-friendly and play a vital role in the detection of breast cancer during its initial stages. In these techniques, recently introduced highly depth-resolved Digitized Frequency Modulated Thermal Wave Imaging (DFMTWI) shows its capability for the diagnosis in the field of biomedical applications. The current work highlights its detection ability and the associated analysis for the initial stages of tumor detection located at different depths inside the simulated breast model via COMSOL Multiphysics by employing the finite element model. Further, the results obtained from the breast model without tumors have been compared with results obtained from the breast model with tumors at different locations by considering the correlation coefficient as a figure of merit.