166 results about "Radiofrequency heating" patented technology

A method and system for the delivery of radiofrequency energy to the tissue, particularly, the prostate, to alleviate the symptoms of BPH is disclosed. The system incorporates a bipolar or multipolar electrode array to create an electric field where the heat created is confined solely to a specific volume of the prostate gland and therefore the heated tissue is defined only by the electrode geometry. The bipolar electrode array provides a variety of three dimensional, symmetric heating patterns within the prostatic tissue depending on the relative electrode lengths and angular separation. The system provides precision tissue temperature and impedance measurements thereby enabling the surgeon to accurately predict heating pattern performance and tissue response to RF heating.

A radio-frequency heating balloon catheter is capable of cauterizing a target lesion in an atrial vestibule. The radio-frequency heating balloon catheter has a catheter tube including an outer tube and an inner tube slidably extended through the outer tube. An inflatable balloon is connected to an extremity of the outer tube and a part near an extremity of the inner tube, and is capable of coming into contact with a target lesion when inflated. A radio-frequency electrode serves as a counter to a surface electrode attached to a surface of a subject's body and is placed in a wall of the balloon or inside the balloon to supply radio-frequency power between the surface electrode and the radio-frequency electrode. A temperature sensor senses temperature inside the balloon, a guide shaft projects from the extremity of the inner tube and is capable of holding the balloon on the target lesion, and a guide wire extends through the catheter tube and the guide shaft.

A system and corresponding method for irradiating a target with electromagnetic radiation to produce a heated region. The system comprises a coupling device operable to couple electromagnetic radiation from a magnetic resonance imaging system. A plurality of energy radiator applicators are connected to the coupling device to receive electromagnetic radiation energy from the coupling device. Each of the radiator applicators is operable to emit a radio frequency heating signal using the electromagnetic radiation energy from the coupling device. A bolus filled with a dielectric fluid is positioned within the inner area of the MRI system. The bolus is operable to receive the radio frequency heating signals from the plurality of energy radiator applicators and direct the radio frequency heating signals into a section of the body to produce a heated region within the body.

An apparatus and associated method provides for the application of a cell treatment agent, such as genetic material or drugs to be inserted within the cells of a patient in vivo. The apparatus may be a catheter arrangement with various embodiments for applying heat to a patient's cells in vivo in order to improve transfection efficiency or application efficiency. Laser beams may be applied directly to the cells. Alternately, the cells may be heated by electrical heating, chemical heating, radio frequency heating, microwave heating, infrared heating, ultrasound heating, or indirect laser heating. Further, the treatment agent may be heated prior to its application to the patient such that the treatment agent heats the cells of the patient.

An apparatus for ablating deposits along the blood vessel of human and animals is disclosed. The apparatus has an extracting and pressurizing unit for extracting blood from a supply vessel and pressurizing it plus a downstream delivering and injecting unit for delivering and injecting the filtered and pressurized source blood into a blood vessel under treatment. Besides inducing a blood circulation and having ablation devices like ultrasound and RF heating, the apparatus ablates the deposits from a nearby portion of the vessel. The characteristics of selective ablation and self-termination make the proposed apparatus safe and effective in treating early-stage atherosclerosis. A DC discharging device can be included to neutralize excess surface charge generation on the wounded healthy tissues following ablation for disinfection and anti-inflammation. Placement of the blood extracting point just downstream of the blood injecting point insures thorough collection and removal of blood-clogging plaque and calcification fragments.

A new application of electromagnetic tomography is described directly related to the efficient recovery of oil and gas as well the removal of unwanted liquids from subsurface formations. The process involves the deployment of both surface and a single borehole magnetic dipole structures used for both transmitting and receiving low frequency electromagnetic energy. The surface antenna consists of circularly concentric arrays of small receiving solenoid antennas and the downhole system consists of one or more solenoid antenna in a single borehole. The concentricity of the surface array is centered about or in proximity to the borehole axis. The electromagnetic field radiated by the downhole antenna is received by each surface antenna. The amplitude and phase of voltages and currents received by each surface antenna is electronically processed based on the theoretical processing principles similar to what has been recently established for electromagnetic impedance tomography (EMIT). Several concentric surface antenna arrays with electronic switching between each circular array and the downhole solenoid will have the ability to image the spread and movement of oil and gas during thermal treatment and provide three dimensional temperature measurement. The oil movement to recovery wells may be provided by radiofrequency heating or steam flood as in enhanced oil recovery. This information allows for developing very efficient oil and fluid recovery techniques by actually observing tomographic images developed according to this invention.

An apparatus and associated method provides for the application of a cell treatment agent, such as genetic material or drugs to be inserted within the cells of a patient in vivo. The apparatus may be a catheter arrangement with various embodiments for applying heat to a patient's cells in vivo in order to improve transfection efficiency or application efficiency. Laser beams may be applied directly to the cells. Alternately, the cells may be heated by electrical heating, chemical heating, radio frequency heating, microwave heating, infrared heating, ultrasound heating, or indirect laser heating. Further, the treatment agent may be heated prior to its application to the patient such that the treatment agent heats the cells of the patient.

The present invention provides medical devices with enhanced ultrasound visibility. The device uses real-time ultrasound monitoring of the position of the needle tip within the patient's body for topical drug delivery, probe positioning, fluid drainage, biopsy, or delivery of ultrasound pulses. The device controls the diffusion of drugs in solid tissues, injects particles into solid tissues, and delivers drugs to specific blood vessels. As the needle is inserted, a fluid with a different ultrasound visibility than the organ environment is injected into the patient. The fluid travels a short distance before being slowed and stopped by the patient's tissues, and the flow can be detected ultrasonically. During needle insertion, the needle position is monitored with ultrasound until the needle is at the ideal point of action. Therapeutic drugs are then delivered through the needle or probes are inserted to perform treatments such as removing tumors with radiofrequency heat. The flow rate can be adjusted during needle insertion to maintain a properly set image of the needle tip. At the point of application, the ultrasound imaging agent can be repeated and pulsed at different flow rates until a satisfactory fluid profile is obtained, after which the drug can be delivered. Ultrasound can also be sent through the needle with a detector mounted in the handheld assembly.

The invention discloses a method for preparing a porous carbon electrode of a super capacitor with high-rate charge-discharge performance. The method comprises the following steps that: a microporous zeolite molecular sieve is taken as a template, gaseous acetylene, methane or ethylene is taken as a carbon source, and a radiofrequency heating device is used to carry out vapor deposition to obtain porous carbon rich in micropores in a quartz tube reactor; the porous carbon undergoes high-temperature heat treatment at the temperature of between 1000 and 1600 DEG C to adjust surface nature to produce porous carbon with large specific surface area; and the porous carbon with large specific surface area and polyfluortetraethylene are mixedly dispersed into alcohol, prepared into paste, and evenly coated on a foamed nickel sheet, and the foamed nickel sheet is dried and pressed to prepare the porous carbon electrode. The method has the advantages that: the prepared carbon with large specific surface area has a homogeneous pore structure; the porous carbon has low surface hydrophilicity and low oxygen content, so the prepared porous carbon electrode is particularly suitable for the super capacitor with the high-rate charge-discharge performance.

A new application of electromagnetic tomography is described directly related to the efficient recovery of oil and gas as well the removal of unwanted liquids from subsurface formations. The process involves the deployment of both surface and a single borehole magnetic dipole structures used for both transmitting and receiving low frequency electromagnetic energy. The surface antenna consists of circularly concentric arrays of small receiving solenoid antennas and the downhole system consists of one or more solenoid antenna in a single borehole. The concentricity of the surface array is centered about or in proximity to the borehole axis. The electromagnetic field radiated by the downhole antenna is received by each surface antenna. The amplitude and phase of voltages and currents received by each surface antenna is electronically processed based on the theoretical processing principles similar to what has been recently established for electromagnetic impedance tomography (EMIT). Several concentric surface antenna arrays with electronic switching between each circular array and the downhole solenoid will have the ability to image the spread and movement of oil and gas during thermal treatment and provide three dimensional temperature measurement. The oil movement to recovery wells may be provided by radio frequency heating or steam flood as in enhanced oil recovery. This information allows for developing very efficient oil and fluid recovery techniques by actually observing topographic images developed according to this invention.

The invention provides a non-invasive treatment device (100) for heating a first (15) and a second (25) inner region of skin using r.f. electrical current, comprising: a first r.f. treatment electrode (10) configured and arranged to allow r.f. current to pass through the first inner region (15) to a return electrode (340), a second r.f. treatment electrode (20) configured and arranged to allow r.f. current to pass through the second inner region (25) to the return electrode (340), the device further being arranged such that the smallest distance between the first r.f. treatment electrode (10) and the return electrode (340) is less than the smallest distance between the second r.f. treatment electrode (20) and the return electrode (340); wherein the electrical skin contact area of the return electrode (340) is 5 or more times larger than the electrical skin contact area of the first r.f. treatment electrode (10), and the electrical skin contact area of the second r.f. treatment electrode (20) is 5 or more times larger than the electrical skin contact area of the first r.f. treatment electrode (10). By incorporating the second and first treatment electrodes in the same device, or probe, the positional relationship between the first and second regions being heated is fixed, or at least more predictable. By means of a suitable configuration, the regions may coincide to a smaller or greater degree. In some cases, the configuration may allow the same skin condition to be treated using heating of the first and second inner regions without moving the device over the skin. By providing an electrical skin contact area of the return electrode which is 5 or more times larger than the electrical skin contact area of the first r.f. treatment electrode, the locations heated by the r.f. electrical current will be proximate to the first treatment electrode, reducing the possibility of undesirable hotspots proximate the return electrode (340).

An electrosurgical generator is disclosed. The electrosurgical generator includes: a power supply configured to output DC power; an inverter coupled to the power supply, the inverter including a plurality of switching elements; and a controller coupled to the inverter and configured to signal the inverter to simultaneously generate based on the DC power a radio frequency heating waveform and an electroporation waveform.

A radio frequency (RF) heating system and process for rapidly and uniformly heating a plurality of articles on a convey line.

Equipment and a process for separating bitumen from oil sand in a process stream are described. The equipment includes several processing vessels and one or more local area radio frequency applicators to selectively heat the process stream in local areas of the equipment. The local area can be adjacent to an input or output of a component of the equipment. Also described is equipment for processing an oil sand—water slurry, including a slurrying vessel, a slurry pipe, and a local area radio frequency applicator. The local area radio frequency applicator is located outside of the slurry pipe, and heats the local area without significantly heating the contents of the slurrying vessel or of the downstream portion of the slurry pipe.

The invention provides a food heating method of radio-frequency heating equipment. The method comprises the steps of obtaining a cooking worksheet corresponding to received food information, wherein the cooking worksheet includes multiple cooking subsidiary stages which are arranged according to a preset sequence; sequentially executing all the cooking subsidiary stages according to the preset sequence. Each cooking subsidiary stage comprises the steps of obtaining and determining, wherein multiple energy absorbing rates of heated food under radio-frequency heating with different frequencies are obtained, the maximal energy absorbing rate is determined as the food absorbing capability, and the frequency corresponding to the maximal energy absorbing rate is determined as a main working frequency of radio-frequency heating modules; heating, wherein the radio-frequency heating modules conduct heating for a preset duration in real time according to the corresponding main working frequencyand a working frequency determined by a corresponding frequency deviation value; repeating of the step of obtaining and determining; finishing. By means of the food heating method of the radio-frequency heating equipment, the speed of cooking the food can be greatly increased, and excellent mouthfeel is achieved.

The invention belongs to the technical field of traditional Chinese medicinal material processing and particularly relates to a multi-layer type vacuum radio frequency and hot wind combined drying method and equipment for rhizomatous traditional Chinese medicinal materials. The equipment comprises a circular hot wind drying system, a radio frequency heating system, a pulse vacuum generation systemand an automatic control system. The circular hot wind drying system comprises a wind return pipeline (9), a wind return pipeline electromagnetic valve (11), a centrifugal fan (13), a wind input pipeline (14), an axial flow fan (15) and the like. The automatic control system comprises a human-computer interaction interface (4). The pulse vacuum generation system comprises a water drainage valve (33), an air drawing pipeline (34) and the like. The radio frequency heating system comprises a fiber optic temperature sensor (26), a material (27), a material tray (28), a weighing support (29), a drying box (47) and the like. In the drying process, the sensor is used for monitoring the change situation of media in the drying box (47) and the material (27), and based on the analysis, decision andexecution of the automatic control system, the complete equipment has the characteristics of being high in automation degree, low in labor intensity and the like.

The invention discloses a radio-frequency heating vapor-extraction advanced-oxidation in-situ restoration apparatus suitable for high-viscosity contaminated soil and a restoration method thereof. The apparatus comprises multiple heating extractors and injection pipes; each heating extractor comprises an extraction pipe and a heating pipe; a radio-frequency electrode is arranged in the heating pipe and is connected with an adapter and a radio-frequency launcher; the outer shell of the extraction pipe is provided with a hole; the inner wall of the extraction pipe is provided with grids; the upper parts of all of the extraction pipes are connected together and connected with a condensation unit, a gas-liquid separator and a vacuum pump in sequence. The restoration method comprises: arranging the multiple heating extractors and the injection pipes, and keeping the distance between per two heating extractors at 2-5 m; respectively injecting calcium carbonate powder with an addition amount of 10%-15% and a sodium persulfate solution with an addition amount 20%-25% into the contaminated soil; and performing intermittent extraction with a heating temperature of 100-500 DEG C and a heating time of 100-140 h. According to the technical scheme, the restoration effect on the high-viscosity contaminated soil is obvious in a short time, the pollutant removing rate is high, the heating is rapid, the restoration time is short and the restoration efficiency is high.

The invention relates to a method and a device for realizing a two-component coating on the surface of SiC fibers, and is applied to the field of deep processing of SiC fibers. The method is to heat the moving tungsten wire with the help of a radio frequency focused heating device, and utilizes the process of forming SiC fibers by vapor deposition: (1) The quartz tube thermal reactor is transformed into three air-tight isolation areas, (2) The tungsten wire heated by the radio frequency electric field passes through three vapor deposition areas in sequence, (3) SiC deposition is realized in the I area to form a SiC fiber layer on the surface of the tungsten wire, (4) the designed inner coating component is deposited in the II area On the surface of the SiC fiber layer, (5) III area is the designed outer coating component deposited on the inner coating surface layer of the SiC fiber layer. The supporting special device is mainly to improve the quartz tube thermal reactor in the radio frequency focused heating device. Specifically, the quartz tube reactor is equipped with a two-way sealed argon gas sealing plug. Port, the position behind the plug is provided with a reaction mixed gas inlet and an additional reaction gas discharge port.

Radio frequency (RF) energy is used to quickly heat the yolk portion of a shell egg. An anode and corresponding cathode are applied to each individual egg. As the egg is selectively and systematically rotated, RF energy and a stream of cooling fluid (preferably water) are simultaneously applied to the egg. This initiates pasteurization of the egg yolk while maintaining a low temperature in the heat-sensitive albumen (egg white) thus preventing denaturation of the albumen. Immediately after the RF yolk heating process, the egg is placed in a hot water bath designed to rapidly pasteurize the albumen as well as to minimize heat loss from the yolk and pasteurize any portion of the yolk that is not already pasteurized through the RF yolk heating process.

An RF heating system for a substrate or substrates including a susceptor for supporting the substrate; one or more RF heating coils; and a platen disposed between the RF heating coil and the substrate. The platen is constructed of materials that become heated under RF energy, which will then radiate heat into the susceptor and the substrate. In this way the susceptor need not be constructed of materials that become heated under RF energy thus minimizing levitation. The platen provides a uniform temperature profile across the substrates, benefiting from a more diffused heat source. The RF heating system may also be utilized in CVD apparatus that deposits materials on a continuous tape or roll.

Thermal conduction to a non-target tissue is unfailingly blocked off to select and effectively ablate only a target tissue. A catheter shaft 1 includes an outer, intermediary and inner tubes 2, 3, 4 which are slidable to each other. An outer balloon 5 is arranged between distal ends 2A, 4A of the outer and inner tubes 4, 5, while an inner balloon 6 is arranged between distal ends 3A, 4A of the intermediary and inner tube 4. The outer balloon 5 is filled with a low thermal conductive gas. Filling solution filled inside the inner balloon 6 is subjected to radiofrequency heating by supplying electricity to an electrode. The outer balloon 5 is held inside a luminal organ and the thermal conduction from the inner balloon 6 is blocked off, thus the thermal energy of the inner balloon 6 selectively ablates a target tissue via a close-contact portion 14.

A method for producing laminated materials is taught, wherein materials are bonded by heating using radio frequency (RF) energy while simultaneously applying pressure. The process for laminating a single piece is generally completed in a matter of seconds, as opposed to the hour(s) required to produce a glass laminate using the current state-of-the-art technology.

An oven may include a cooking chamber configured to receive a heat modulating material (HMM), a radio frequency (RF) heating system configured to provide RF energy into the cooking chamber, and a cooking controller configured to control the frequency of RF energy provided by the RF heating system into the cooking chamber. The MINI may be configured to contain a food product and may include a thermally active section. The thermally active section may include a base matrix and a particulate material dispersed in the base matrix.

A hydrocarbon fluid pipeline may include pipeline segments connected together in end-to-end relation between first and second spaced apart geographic locations and configured to carry hydrocarbon fluid therethrough. The hydrocarbon fluid pipeline may also include a radio frequency (RF) heating station that may include an RF source and an RF heater between adjacent pipeline segments of the plurality thereof. The RF heater may include an inner tubular dielectric coupler between the adjacent pipeline segments, and an electrically conductive outer housing surrounding the inner tubular dielectric coupler and connected to the RF source to heat the hydrocarbon fluid.

The invention discloses a rice bran stabilization method and a radiofrequency heating device. The treatment method comprises the following steps: removing impurities from fresh rice bran, weighing a certain amount of the rice bran, placing the rice bran in a container, spreading the rice bran to make the thickness be 1-1.5 cm, placing the container filled with the rice bran between two pole plates of the radiofrequency heating device, setting a spacing between the two pole plates at 15-25 cm and the radiofrequency temperature at 80-120 DEG C, carrying out radiofrequency treatment to quickly heat the rice bran to a required temperature, immediately taking out the heated rice bran, carrying out heat insulation for 5-30 min by using an oven with the temperature being the required temperature, taking out the rice bran, naturally cooling the heated rice bran, filling a sealing plastic bag with the cooled rice bran, and storing the rice bran at 30 DEG C. The radiofrequency heating device comprises a supporting table, a conveyor belt, a radiofrequency unit, a hot air distributer, a hot air pipeline and a hot air generator. The rice bran stabilization method and the radiofrequency heating device reach the rice bran stabilization purpose through sending the rice bran to the conveyor belt of a radiofrequency heating system and allowing the rice bran to move with the conveyor belt and be irradiated with radiofrequency in order to kill the enzymes contained in the rice bran.

The invention relates to a method for flexibly sterilizing ready-to-eat surimi products by combining radio frequency and hot blast, and belongs to the technical field of sterilization of meat products. The method disclosed by the invention comprises the following steps of performing vacuum packing on surimi products which can be directly eaten, then placing the packed surimi products on a polyether imides (PEI) dielectric resistance block in a radio-frequency working space, directly performing radio frequency-hot blast combined sterilization, and performing preservation at normal temperature. The radio frequency and hot blast combined sterilizing technology is simple to operate, and the PEI dielectric resistance blocks can notably reduce an edge superheat effect caused by radio-frequency heating. The prepared surimi products can keep good flavor, texture, color and nutrient quality, and are convenient and safe to eat. The quality guarantee period of the prepared surimi products can reach 9 months or more under normal temperature, so that requirements of consumers for safety, dainty and convenience of modern food of consumers are met, the industrialized production is easy to realize, and the market prospects are broad.