L.N. Anishchenko, I.A. Vasiliev, A.A. Demendeev, S.I. Ivashov, V.V. Razevig

Breast cancer is one of the leading diseases among women nowadays. As a rule, the routine diagnostic procedure consists of individual examination by doctors and mammography or ultrasound screening. Screening for early detection of breast cancer is conducted by these methods at 12-24 month intervals, which can not guarantee identification of aggressive tumors. Therefore, there is a need for a new method, which could detect the tumors at the earliest stage possible. This problem may be solved with the help of holographic radar, which detects dielectric inhomogeneities. It is known that the dielectric properties of normal and malignant breast tissues differ even at the earliest stage of a tumor genesis. Thus, frequent scans with holographic radar could be used for safe early stage breast tumor detection. This report presents the results of two series of experiments carried out to confirm the possibility of using holographic radar for the detection of breast tumors. A specially constructed model breast with two dielectrically realistic inclusions of various sizes simulating neoplasm was used in the experiments. It was found out that among holographic radars operating at 4 and 7 GHz the latter is preferable for breast inhomogeneity detection. Reconstruction of the holograms may significantly improve the quality of the image and its resolution. An improved method of scanning that is in development is also described.