Survey and Classification of Antennas for Medical Applications

This manuscript provides a comprehensive survey of various antenna types used in microwave medical applications. This research is the first step towards the development of a thorough numerical library containing various components used in microwave medical systems such as antennas, phantoms, matching media, etc. The goal of this effort is to enable researchers in this field to efficiently and easily test their algorithms and/or hardware using standardized components. In addition, such a library would encourage considering the whole system instead of partial approach in which, for e.g., developing imaging algorithms ignored the physical sensors etc. Here, we consider various antenna designs that have emerged in the last two decades. In particular, we discuss the chronological evolution of antennas for hyperthermia, biotelemetry and microwave imaging. We also classify antennas with respect to utilized frequency band, such as Medical Implant Communication Service (MICS), Industrial, Scientific and Medical (ISM) Radio Bands, and Ultra Wide-Band (UWB).