Composite Tissue-Type and Probability Image for Ultrasound and Microwave Tomography

The concept of creating a composite tissue-type-image (cTTI) along with an associated probability image is introduced for ultrasound and microwave tomography. The cTTI integrates information available within different quantitative property images, and the associated probability image provides an indication of the level of confidence regarding the reconstructed tissue types. It is shown that the cTTI concept can be applied to ultrasound tomography property images, microwave tomography property images, as well as to their combination. Thus, the concept is generalizable to the amalgamation of quantitative information derived from a wide variety of modalities with the goal of increasing the confidence in the reconstructed cTTI. Validation of the concept is performed on MRI-derived numerical breast phantoms containing up to five different tissue types.