SUMMARY
Clinical hyperthermia refers to treatment of tumors by directly administering heat to the lesion. Several clinical trials have demonstrated that hyperthermia provides significant improvements in clinical outcomes for a variety of tumors, especially when combined with radiotherapy. However, its routine clinical application is still not optimal and major improvements are needed. The temperature distributions achieved are far from satisfactory and improved temperature control and monitoring are still in need development. The use of gold nanoparticles has emerged to be a good method to achieve local heat delivery using laser-induced thermal therapy. Gold nanoparticles have a plasmon resonance frequency that can be tuned to absorb strongly in the near-infrared region; where tissue absorption is minimal therefore allowing for less tissue heating and better penetration. For further development of the technique and appropriate clinical translation, it is essential to have a computational method by which the temperature distribution within the tumor and surrounding tissue can be estimated. Our group has developed a technique to estimate the temperature increase in a nanoparticle-filled medium, by taking into account the heat generated from individual gold nanoparticles. The method involved a two-step approach that combines the temperature rise due to nanoparticles; and the solution to the heat equation using the laser light as heat source. The goal of this project is to develop a one step approach that calculates the temperature distribution using the solution to the heat equation with multiple heat source terms, the laser light and each individual nanoparticle. This method can be of great use in developing a treatment planning technique using near-infrared irradiation of gold nanoparticles.