Innovative ISM and Diagnostic Applications of Microwaves

The widest employment of electromagnetic (EM) waves is probably in the telecommunication area. Nevertheless, the potential of electromagnetism goes beyond telecommunication and can find application in a variety of fields. Structures such as antennas and resonant cavities allow the generation of well-known EM fields that is possible to use in a controlled way. In this thesis, different uses of EM field are proposed, involving different areas. As a high power application, in the agriculture sector, a model to evaluate the feasibility of using EM waves to disinfect the superficial layer of the soil is presented. The variation of the dielectric constant due to the raise in temperature is taken into account and power and time of irradiation to obtain the desired profile of temperature of the soil is determined. A medium power application uses a resonant cavity as a (temperature) controlled environment in which an enzymatic reaction takes place in an aqueous solution. The yield of the reaction is compared with the yield obtained using conventional heating. As a low power application, healthcare sector is considered, and the design of an array of coil on a flexible substrate for magnetic resonance is presented. Furthermore, a numerical evaluation of the EM field, inside a full blood bag, is carried out, to compare it with the EM field generated by an RFID reader intended to be used for identification of blood bags.