Study of Amorphous Silicon Temperature Sensors in Saline Solution for Microwave Thermal Ablation

This work explores the use of amorphous silicon temperature sensors for temperature monitoring in Microwave Thermal Ablation (MTA). MTA is a minimally invasive technique that uses the heat generated by microwave elec-tromagnetic fields (EMF) to destroy pathological tissues. MTA is performed by inserting an antenna in the target tissue; then, the antenna is allowed to radiate an EMF which is absorbed by the tissue, thus raising the tissues’ temperature. To optimize MTA and to avoid damage to the surrounding healthy tissues, it is fundamental to monitor the temperature during the treatment. Here we investigate a solution based on hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) temperature sensors, that, thanks to their small dimensions and low depo-sition temperature, are suitable to be integrated directly on the MTA antennas. This work is focused on a study of the sensors’ stability in a dissipative envi-ronment similar to human tissues; the scope is to analyze the feasibility of tem-perature monitoring in MTA through a-SI:H diodes.