Authors
Qibin Wang, Xinyue Chen, Lei Li, Kaixiong Yang, Lingwen Hou, Wang Shu, Zhongyi Wu, Xin Feng, Shouping Zhu
Published in
IEEE transactions on bio-medical engineering. Volume PP. Aug 03, 2026. Epub Aug 03, 2026.
Abstract
Magnetic tracer-guided sentinel lymph node (SLN) biopsy offers a radiation-free alternative for nodal staging in breast cancer and other solid tumors. However, current handheld magnetometers often require high superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticle (SPION) doses due to limited sensitivity and detection depth, leading to skin staining and MRI artifacts.
We developed FerriMag, a handheld ferrite magnetometer integrating a central high-permeability Mn-Zn ferrite core to enhance magnetic excitation and signal reception. Lock-in amplification and bandpass filtering were employed to suppress interference.
The ferrite core increased the excitation field strength by 11-fold and receiving-coil sensitivity by 1.7-fold. FerriMag achieved a detection limit of 21.6 ng Fe and reliably detected 0.5 μg Fe at a depth of 10 mm. In a rabbit model, accurate SLN localization was obtained with only 0.05 mL (0.5 mg Fe) of SPIONs, without visible skin staining. Metastatic nodes exhibited significantly reduced SPION uptake (p = 0.0005) and slower signal rise(p = 0.038) compared to non-metastatic nodes.
FerriMag improves the sensitivity and detection depth of handheld magnetic SLN detection, enabling reliable low dose SPION-based SLN localization in vivo.
This system provides a low-cost, radiation-free, and clinically translatable platform for low-dose magnetic SLN detection, with potential applicability beyond breast cancer and possible utility for intraoperative nodal assessment.
PMID:
42546002
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 04 Aug 2026.
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