Open AccessLow‐cost and compact RF switching system for wearable microwave head imaging with performance verification on artificial head phantom
Author(s) -
Bashri Mohd Saiful Riza,
Arslan Tughrul
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
iet microwaves, antennas and propagation
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.555
H-Index - 69
eISSN - 1751-8733
pISSN - 1751-8725
DOI - 10.1049/iet-map.2017.0486
Subject(s) - imaging phantom , microcontroller , human head , computer science , wideband , head (geology) , microwave , radio frequency , electronic engineering , electrical engineering , acoustics , computer hardware , engineering , physics , optics , telecommunications , geomorphology , geology , absorption (acoustics)
This study presents a low‐cost, compact and lightweight radio frequency (RF) switching system for wearable head imaging applications. The proposed switching system is made from commercial off‐the‐shelf components. The switching system provides a wideband performance which covers operating frequency band from DC to 4 GHz. A low‐power microcontroller is integrated with two RF switches as a control system. An array of 12 wideband monopole antennas were connected to the proposed switching circuit and its performance was evaluated using an artificial human head phantom. To verify the performance of the system, a haemorrhagic stroke was mimicked by placing a spherical target of 30 mm in diameter inside the fabricated head phantom. Two data acquisition methods were applied using the switching system. In the first method, the reflection coefficients of the antennas were collected for healthy and unhealthy brain injury cases. For the second method, the transmission coefficients of the antennas were collected by utilising four antennas in the array as transmitting antennas while the rest of the antennas act as receiving antennas. The authors demonstrate that the proposed compact switching system could be used for future real‐time wearable detection systems embedded in various headgear products.