A low-cost microwave sensing platform for water accumulation abnormality detection in lungs

In this article, water accumulation abnormalities in small-scale lungs are numerically and experimentally studied at microwave regime. The noninvasive passive microwave sensing platform considered here comprises the use of two low-profile patch antennas. The sensors, operating at the ISM band, are attached back-to-back to the skin surface of the lungs. By monitoring the sudden changes of computed transmission coefficient (both magnitude and phase) between the two sensors, qualitative measures can be developed to estimate whether significant water accumulation in lungs take place or not, which can provide further insights at an early medical diagnosis. Several numerical case studies are developed and studied here that mimic various water accumulation scenarios within the modeled lungs. A practical small-scale yet low-cost platform integrated with the microwave sensors was demonstrated and validated. The results correlate reasonably well with numerical results.