Engineering Commons^™

Investigating The Impact Of Hypoxia On Reactive Oxygen Species Generation Within Murine Breast Cancer Cells, Jared Mcpeake

Biomedical Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

When cancer metastasizes from a primary tumor site to secondary site through the bloodstream or lymph, the cancer becomes more difficult to treat. For this reason, it is vital to study what indicates the metastatic potential of a tumor. Current research has shown that cell lines with high metastatic potential display increased levels of metabolic adaptability over their nonmetastatic counterparts after undergoing hypoxic conditions. One method of assessing this adaptability is to measure the concentration of reactive oxygen species (ROS) produced by the cells while undergoing oxidative stress. In highly adaptable metastatic cells, an increase of ROS buildup within the …

A Novel Ultrasound Elastography Technique For Evaluating Tumor Response To Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy In Patients With Locally Advanced Breast Cancer, Niusha Kheirkhah

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Breast cancer is the second most diagnosed cancer in women, estimated to affect 1 in 8 women during their lifetime. About 10% to 20% of new breast cancer cases are diagnosed with locally advanced breast cancer (LABC). LABC tumors are usually larger than 5 cm and/or attached to the skin or chest wall. It has been reported that when such cases are treated with surgery alone, metastasis and mortality rates are high, especially where skin involvement or attachment to the chest wall is extensive. As such, efficient treatment for this kind of breast cancer includes neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC) to shrink …

Correlation Of Acute Radiation Dermatitis To Tissue Oxygenation In Radiation Therapy Treated Breast Cancer Subjects, Edwin Alexander Robledo

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Over 95% of radiation therapy (RT) treated breast cancer subjects undergo an adverse skin reaction known as radiation dermatitis (RD). Assessment of severity or grading of RD is clinically visual and hence subjective. Our objective is to determine sub-clinical tissue oxygenation (StO₂) changes in response to RT treatment in breast cancer subjects using near-infrared spectroscopic imaging and correlate these changes to RD grading. A WIRB approved 6-8 week longitudinal pilot study was carried out on 10 RT-treated subjects at Miami Cancer Institute. Significant changes (p < 0.05) in StO₂ of irradiated and contralateral chest wall and axilla regions with weeks of …

Experimental And Analysis Of Electromagnetic Characterization Of Biological And Non-Biological Materials In Microwave, Millimeter-Wave, And Terahertz Frequency Bands, Nagma Vohra

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The goal of this research is to characterize the electromagnetic properties of biological and non-biological materials at terahertz (THz), millimeter-wave, and microwave frequency bands. The biological specimens are measured using the THz imaging and spectroscopy system, whereas the non-biological materials are measured using the microwave and millimeter-wave free-space system. These facilities are located in the Engineering Research Center at the University of Arkansas. The THz imaging system (TPS 3000) uses a Ti-Sapphire laser directed on the photoconductive antennas to generate a THz time domain pulse. Upon using the Fourier Transform, the spectrum of the pulsed THz signal includes frequencies from …

Statistical Machine Learning For Breast Cancer Detection With Terahertz Imaging, Tanny Andrea Chavez Esparza

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Breast conserving surgery (BCS) is a common breast cancer treatment option, in which the cancerous tissue is excised while leaving most of the healthy breast tissue intact. The lack of in-situ margin evaluation unfortunately results in a re-excision rate of 20-30% for this type of procedure. This study aims to design statistical and machine learning segmentation algorithms for the detection of breast cancer in BCS by using terahertz (THz) imaging. Given the material characterization properties of the non-ionizing radiation in the THz range, we intend to employ the responses from the THz system to identify healthy and cancerous breast tissue …

Investigation On Nanoparticle Based Combination Therapy For Targeted Cancer Treatment, Muhammad Raisul Abedin

Doctoral Dissertations

“The current treatment methods in cancer are associated with toxicity in healthy tissues, partial therapeutic response, drug resistance and finally recurrence of the disease. The cancer drugs are challenged by non-specific binding, undesired toxicity in healthy cells, low therapeutic index and finally poor therapeutic outcome. In this work, a targeted nanoscale therapeutic system Antibody Drug Nanoparticle (ADN) was engineered to selectively inhibit the breast cancer cell growth with reduced toxicity in healthy cells. The ADNs were designed by synthesizing rod shaped anoparticles using pure chemotherapeutic drug and covalently conjugating a therapeutic monoclonal antibody (mAb) on the surface of the drug …

Optical Spectrsocopy Of Murine Breast Tumor To Distinguish Indolent From Aggressive Disease, Joel Rodriguez Troncoso

Biomedical Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

Breast cancer accounts for 30% of all cancer. Metastasis is the primary cause of death among breast cancer patients. Additionally, current molecular profiling methods such as Oncotype DX, which are expensive and not widely available at all clinical facilities, only determine the risk of recurrence after treatment. Therefore, there are no current method capable of identifying metastatic patients in advance.As a result, there is an unmet clinical need to develop a cost-effective prognostic to differentiate between indolent and aggressive breast tumors. In this study, we implemented diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (DRS) system to evaluate functional changes in tumor xenografts originated from …

Ultrasound-Guided Optical Techniques For Cancer Diagnosis: System And Algorithm Development, Atahar Kamal Mostafa

McKelvey School of Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Worldwide, breast cancer is the most common cancer among women. In the United States alone, the American cancer society has estimated there will be 271,270 new breast cancer cases in 2019, and 42,260 lives will be lost to the disease. Ultrasound (US), mammography, and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) are regularly used for breast cancer diagnosis and therapy monitoring. However, they sometimes fail to diagnose breast cancer effectively. These shortcomings have motivated researchers to explore new modalities. One of these modalities, diffuse optical tomography (DOT), utilizes near-infrared (NIR) light to reveal the optical properties of tissue. NIR-based DOT images the contrast …

Biophysical Features Of The Extracellular Matrix Direct Breast Cancer Metastasis, Alyssa Schwartz

Doctoral Dissertations

Breast cancer is plagued by two key clinical challenges; drug resistance and metastasis. Most work to date probes these events on an extremely rigid plastic surface, which recapitulates few aspects of these processes in humans. A malignant cell first resides in breast tissue, then likely travels to the bone, brain, liver, or lung, each of which has a distinct mechanical and biochemical profile. Cells transmit mechanical forces into intracellular tension and biochemical signaling events, and here we hypothesize that this mechanotransduction influences drug response, growth, and migration. To probe the impact of extracellular matrix on drug resistance, we defined a …

Experimental And Model-Based Terahertz Imaging And Spectroscopy For Mice, Human, And Phantom Breast Cancer Tissues, Tyler Bowman

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The goal of this work is to investigate terahertz technology for assessing the surgical margins of breast tumors through electromagnetic modeling and terahertz experiments. The measurements were conducted using a pulsed terahertz system that provides time and frequency domain signals. Three types of breast tissues were investigated in this work. The first was formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded tissues from human infiltrating ductal and lobular carcinomas. The second was human tumors excised within 24-hours of lumpectomy or mastectomy surgeries. The third was xenograft and transgenic mice breast cancer tumors grown in a controlled laboratory environment to achieve more data for statistical analysis.

Experimental …

A 3d Us Guidance System For Permanent Breast Seed Implantation: Development And Validation, Justin Michael

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Permanent breast seed implantation (PBSI) is a promising breast radiotherapy technique that suffers from operator dependence. We propose and have developed an intraoperative 3D ultrasound (US) guidance system for PBSI.

A tracking arm mounted to a 3D US scanner registers a needle template to the image. Images were validated for linear and volumetric accuracy, and image quality in a volunteer. The tracking arm was calibrated, and the 3D image registered to the scanner. Tracked and imaged needle positions were compared to assess accuracy and a patient-specific phantom procedure guided with the system.

Median/mean linear and volumetric error was ±1.1% and …

Effects Of Stroma On Er+ Breast Cancer Cell Metastasis, Shipeng Xu, Luis Solorio, Sarah Calve

The Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) Symposium

Breast cancer is one of the most wide-spread diseases among women in America. If the cancer is local, it is easily controlled by surgical resection. However, if the cancer cells metastasize, patient survival is significantly reduced. 70% of breast cancers can be targeted through estrogen receptors (ER) on the membrane, with compounds such as tamoxifen. However, tamoxifen shows unreliable outcomes on different patients and it is believed that the ineffectiveness of tamoxifen is related to the epithetical-mesenchymal transition (EMT) of cancer cells. To address this problem, we are designing a system that stimulates metastasis activation with the aim of incorporating …

Characterization And Assessment Of Mechanical Properties Of Adipose Derived Breast Tissue Scaffolds As A Means For Breast Reconstructive Purposes, Ehsan Omidi

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Decellularized adipose tissue (DAT) has shown great potential for use as a regenerative scaffold in breast reconstruction following mastectomies or lumpectomies. Mechanical properties of such scaffolds are of great importance in order to mimic natural adipose tissue. This study focuses on the characterization of mechanical properties and assessment of DAT scaffolds for implantation into a human breast. DAT samples sourced from multiple adipose tissue depots within the body were tested and their elastic and hyperelastic parameters were obtained. Subsequently simulations were conducted where the calculated hyperelastic parameters were tested as a real human breast model under two different gravity loading …

Experimental Terahertz Imaging And Spectroscopy Of Ex-Vivo Breast Cancer Tissue, Tyler C. Bowman

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis presents experimental results of terahertz imaging and spectroscopy techniques to analyze excised breast cancer tissue. The pulsed terahertz system at the University of Arkansas was used to assess formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded breast cancer tissue obtained from 22, 40, and 46 year old patients. The tissue for this research was sliced to relatively thin sections of 10 μm thick and mounted on glass slides. Terahertz reflection time and frequency domain images of the breast cancer tissue were then obtained and compared to histopathology slides from the same patient. Results showed good correlation between the reflection images and histopathology slides for …

Investigation Of Buildup Dose For Therapeutic Intensity Modulated Photon Beams In Radiation Therapy, Khosrow Javedan

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Buildup dose of Mega Voltage (MV) photon beams can be a limiting factor in intensitymodulated radiation therapy (IMRT) treatments. Excessive doses can cause patient discomfort and treatment interruptions, while underdosing may lead to local failure.

Many factors which contribute to buildup dose, including the photon beam energy spectrum, scattered or contaminant radiation and their angular distribution, are not modeled well in commercial treatment planning systems. The accurate Monte Carlo method was employed in the studies to estimate the doses.

Buildup dose of 6MV photon beams was investigated for three fundamentally different IMRT modalities: between Helical TomoTherapy and traditional opposed tangential …

Evaluation Of Intra-And Inter-Fraction Motion In Breast Radiotherapy Using Electronic Portal Imaging Cine Loops, Chrison Lee, Edward Yu, Tomas Kron

Edward Yu

Parallel tangent breast irradiation is commonly used postbreast conservation surgery for early breast cancer patient without lymph node involvement to improve local disease control. Intra-fractional and inter-fractional variabilities are often presented in daily treatment setup. The present pilot study used Electronic Portal Imaging (EPI) to evaluate intra-and inter-fraction motion in patients undergoing simple breast tangent radiotherapy.

Inducing A Normal Phenotype In Breast Epithelial Cells Using A Three-Dimensional Basement Membrane Extract Culture System: A Study On The Reversion Of Cancer, Ross H. Booth

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Experimentally, traditional developmental models and transgenic animals consistently underscore the importance of studying cell behavior in the correct tissue context. However, live animal experimentation is inherently complex, and systematic assessment of the effects of individual variables, such as cell shape and matrix compliance on cell behavior, is extremely difficult at best. Two-dimensional monolayer culture of key individual cell types has provided abundant, fundamental information on cell response, but cannot be used to show the normal phenotype of breast epithelial cells. Furthermore, their results often fail to translate into in vivo and clinical studies. It has been previously established that normal …

Detection Of Clustered Microcalcifications Using Wavelets, Donald A. Mccandless

Theses and Dissertations

An automated method for detecting microcalcification clusters is presented. The algorithm begins with a digitized mammogram and outputs the center coordinates of regions of interest (ROIs) that contain microcalcification clusters. The method presented uses a 12-tap Least Asymmetric Daubechies (LAD12) wavelet in a tree structured filter bank to increase the signal to noise level of microcalcifications. The signal to noise level gain achieved by the filtering allows subsequent thresholding to eliminate on average 90% of the image from further consideration without eliminating actual microcalcifications 95% of the time. A novel approach to isolating individual calcifications from background tissue through non-stationary …

Computer Aided Detection Of Microcalcifications Utilizing Texture Analysis, Ronald C. Dauk

Theses and Dissertations

A comparative study of texture measures for the classification of breast tissue is presented. The texture features investigated include Angular Second Moments, Power Spectrum Analysis and a novel feature, Laws Energy Ratios. The texture study was accomplished as part of the development of a Model Based Vision (MBV) system for the automatic detection of microcalcifications. An overview of the Microcalcification Detection System is presented, which applies image differencing techniques, feature selection methods, and neural networks for locating microcalcification clusters in mammograms. The Power Spectrum Analysis feature set had the best overall performance with an 83% Probability of Detection and an …

Computer-Aided Diagnosis Of Mammographic Masses, William E. Polakowski

Theses and Dissertations

A new Model-Based Vision algorithm was developed to find possibly cancerous regions of interest (ROIs) in digitized mammograms and to correctly identify the malignant masses. This work has shown a sensitivity of 92 percent for locating malignant ROIs. The database contained 272 images (12 bit, 1OO microns) with 36 malignant and 53 benign mass images. Of the 53 biopsied benign cases, 74 percent were correctly classified. The Focus of Attention (segmentation) Module algorithm used a physiologically motivated Difference of Gaussians (DoG) filter to highlight mass-like regions in the mammogram. The Index Module labeled the regions by their hypothesized class: large …