Electromagnetic imaging and therapeutic (EMIT) systems

• US 6,026,173 A
• Filed: 07/05/1997
• Issued: 02/15/2000
• Est. Priority Date: 07/05/1997
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: EMTensor GmbH, The Carolinas Heart Institute
• Original Assignee: The Carolinas Heart Institute
• Inventors: Baranov, Vladimir, Svenson, Robert H., Semenov, Serguei Y.
• Primary Examiner(s): Au, Amelia
• Assistant Examiner(s): Wu, Jingge
• Application Number:
  US08/896,525
• Time in Patent Office: 955 Days
• Field of Search: 600/425, 600/430, 600/429, 73/601, 73/602, 73/620, 382/128, 382/131, 324/637, 324/638, 324/639
• US Class Current: 382/131
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 18/1815 using microwaves
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/05 Detecting, measuring or recording for diagnosis by means of electric currents or magnetic fields; Measuring using microwaves or radio waves impedance plethysmography A61B5/0295; measuring movement of the entire body or parts thereof A61B5/11; detecting, measuring or recording bioelectric or biomagnetic signals of the body or parts thereof A61B5/24
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/0507 using microwaves or terahertz waves
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/0536 Impedance imaging, e.g. by tomography

Abstract

The invention is a system and method for non-invasive tomographic spectroscopy of tissue using a plurality of microwave emitter-receivers spatially oriented to the tissue, an interface medium placed between the emitter-receivers, and a control subsystem operably coupled to the plurality of emitter-receivers for selectively controlling power to the plurality of emitter-receivers and for receiving signals from the plurality of emitter-receivers so that multiple frequency radiation is emitted from a selected plurality of emitter-receivers and received by a selected plurality of emitter-receivers after interacting with and passing through the tissue, and a computational subsystem operably connected to the control subsystem for computing a tomographic spectroscopic image of the tissue from the microwave signals received from the selected plurality of emitter-receivers.

Claims

1. A method of detecting the onset of biological tissue disease comprising the method of:

a) designating a target tissue area for electromagnetic irradiation;

b) determining expected tissue dielectric values for the designated target tissue area at frequencies above and below the relaxation frequency of the designated target tissue;

c) providing a multiple frequency radiation emitting and receiving system having emission means comprising a plurality of emitter-receiver locations, receiving means comprising a plurality of emitter-receiver locations, and signal analysis means;

d) irradiating the target tissue area with the multiple frequency radiation emitted from a plurality of emitter-receiver locations, said multiple frequency radiation being suitable for discreet detection of intracellular, extracellular and cell membrane resistances;

e) receiving the radiation from the irradiated target tissue area with the microwave receiving means; and

f) analyzing the received radiation with the signal analysis means to obtain observed tissue dielectric values an comparing the observed tissue dielectric values for a desired range of frequencies best correlating to the target tissue with the expected tissue dielectric values to determine a change in the physiologic state of the target tissue indicative of an onset of tissue disease.

2. The method of claim 1 in which the multiple frequency radiation is preferably within a range of about 100 kHz to about 6 GHz.