Wenfeng Xia

Project title

Development of the second generation of Twente Photoacoustic Mammoscope (PAM II)

Project goals

Develop and characterize instrumentation for a fast computerized tomographic photoacoustic high-resolution imager for detection/diagnosis of breast caner.

Project summary

The current imaging modalities of the female breast for the detection/ diagnosis of cancer have their limitations. A promising novel technology to achieve high sensitivity, non-ionization, high resolution and functional imaging is photoacoustic breast imaging. Photoacoustic imaging combines the advantages of pure optical imaging and ultrasound image, therefore, has large image depth but the same sensitivity comparing to pure optical imaging.

We have developed the first generation of Twente Photoacoustic Mammoscope (PAM I), it shows the promising ability for detecting malignancies in the beasts in clinical situation. In order to speed up and improve the resolution and sensitivity of the system, we are developing in this project the second generation of Twente Photoacoustic Mammoscope (PAM II), which is based on computerized tomographic configuration. In addition, this imager also has ability to image the acoustic velocity and attenuation in the breast tissue to distinguish cancerous and normal tissue.