DEVELOPMENT OF MR-BASED PROCEDURES FOR THE IMPLEMENTATION OF PATIENT-SPECIFIC DIELECTRIC MODELS FOR CLINICAL USE

Abstract

Nowadays, many medical techniques are based on the application of electromagnetic fields (EMF) on human body. For the optimization of these techniques, it is necessary to understand the mechanisms of interaction between the biological system under exposure and the applied EMF. Since this interaction is described by the dielectric properties of the biological system, an accurate dielectric characterization of human body is necessary. Biological tissues are complex and heterogeneous, and their dielectric properties can vary significantly from the ex-vivo to the in vivo condition. For this reason, there is the need to measure these properties for a specific subject. Unfortunately, traditional techniques used to measure dielectric properties of tissues are not able to reach this aim and an alternative method must be devised. In this work, a model is proposed for the reconstruction of dielectric properties of biological tissues from MR acquisitions. This model is wideband, specific, applicable in vivo and useful for those medical techniques that need a precise dielectric characterization of the patients.