Edoardo Gino Macchi, Giovanni Braschi, Mario Gallati

Frontiers in Heat and Mass Transfer (FHMT) 5 - 20 (2014)

Radiofrequency thermal ablation (RFTA) is a medical procedure currently widely adopted for liver tumors treatment. Its outcome is strongly influenced by temperature distribution near the RF applicator therefore continuous measurements are required both to validate RFTA numerical models and to better control the outcome of the procedure. The space-time evolution of the thermal field during RFTA on ex vivo porcine liver tissue has been measured by infrared thermal imaging in different experimental setups. A three-dimensional simulation of the whole experiment allowed to suitably reproduce all the features of the thermal field measurements and to validate the proposed measurement methodology.