The use of technologies still under development (Silicon PhotoMultipliers and Time-to-Digital Converter) for the upgrade of our time-resolved optical mammograph highlighted the crucial need for a thorough and progressive instrument characterization (from extensive laboratory tests on phantoms to in vivo measurements), potentially of general interest. Despite satisfying results on phantoms, in vivo tests urged an instrumental change, with the adoption of a just released high-throughput TDC to obtain high-quality breast scans (much wider scan area, better day-by-day reproducibility, improved signal quality, simpler set-up). A clinical study on monitoring of neoadjuvant chemotherapy is now ongoing at the San Raffaele Hospital, Milan.
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