Design of ultra-wideband antenna for the localization of pulmonary lesions during thoracoscopic surgery

Biopsies or surgical excisions for diagnosis should be taken for pulmonary lesions which show evidence of growth or are larger than 8 mm. This is usually performed by video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery. To improve the intraoperative localization of these lesions, we propose to add an ultra-wideband antenna directly on a thoracoscopic tool and locate the lesion through microwave imaging. Here the design of an antenna for such a goal is undertaken. Numerical simulations are used to quantify the influence of a fictional lung lesion on the signal recorded by a bowtie antenna of different lengths (2 to 6 cm) and widths (0.5 to 1.5 cm). It is found that the most important design parameter is the total length of the antenna. The width of the antenna, instead, affects only marginally the signals, but it has a limited effect for deeper lesions