Real-time MRI-controlled ultrasound hyperthermia system for superficial tumor treatment

Abstract

Ultrasound hyperthermia is one of the most important methods in tumor treatment and characterized by non-invasiveness. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)-based temperature mapping techniques are safe compared with invasive methods and have been applied to detect temperature changes for a variety of applications. Among these techniques, the proton resonance frequency (PRF) method is relatively advanced. With a temperature measuring experiment, the effectiveness of PRF method has been proved, because the outcome temperature curve and the real temperature curve fit well. After that, an experiment has been conducted on tumors inside rabbit legs and the result indicates that this system is able to performance hyperthermia at targets based on PRF method in temperature mapping.