Muscle Analyzer System: Exploring Correlation Between Novel Microwave Resonator and Ultrasound-based Tissue Information in the Thigh

A microwave sensor to safely measure quality of muscle tissue for diagnosis and screening of diseases and medical conditions characterized by fat infiltration in muscle is presented. Fat infiltration in muscle may be seen by a lower dielectric constant of muscle at microwave frequencies corresponding to the large contrast between fat and muscle tissues. A planar resonator based on a bandstop filter and optimized to noninvasively interrogate muscle in the thigh on tissue quality is proposed. Currently, a study based on clinical trials is carried out, and, here, we present a preliminary correlation between skin and fat thicknesses and rectus femoris cross sectional area (CSA) measured with ultrasound and the proposed sensor's resonance frequency. CST simulations based on the ultrasound information guide the analysis. We see that although there are signs of a potential correlation between CSA and resonance, skin and fat variability is still an issue to overcome.