A solid tissue phantom made of agar, Intralipid and black ink is described and characterized. The preparation procedure is fast and easily implemented with standard laboratory equipment. An instrumentation for time-resolved transmittance measurements was used to determine the optical properties of the phantom. The absorption and the reduced scattering coefficients are linear with the ink and Intralipid concentrations, respectively. A systematic decrease of the reduced scattering coefficient dependent on the agar content is observed, but can easily be managed. The phantom is highly homogeneous and shows good repeatability among different preparations. Moreover, agar inclusions can be easily embedded in either solid or liquid matrixes, and no artefacts are caused by the solid-solid or solid-liquid interfaces. This allows one to produce reliable and realistic inhomogeneous phantoms with known optical properties, particularly interesting for studies on optical imaging through turbid media.
Fluorescence lifetime imaging is a rather new and effective tool that can be used to study complex biological samples, either at microscopic or macroscopic levels. The map of the fluorescence lifetime allows one to discriminate amongst different fluorophores and to achieve valuable insights into the behaviour of emitting molecules, leading to information like local pH, oxygen concentration in cells, etc. Moreover, the distribution in space of any fluorescent marker achievable with this technique can be exploited for diagnostic purposes in medicine. After a brief introduction on the motivations for applying fluorescence lifetime imaging in biology and medicine, the basic principles of this technique will be addressed. Then, the two possible implementations of fluorescence lifetime imaging (i.e. the frequency domain and the time domain methods) will be presented. For this purpose, special attention will be devoted to practical aspects of image acquisition and processing, especially for what concerns the time domain method. Then, the analysis of the state-of-the-art systems will include a brief discussion on new concepts that have recently been introduced in this research field. Finally, two interesting applications of fluorescence lifetime imaging will be presented. The former refers to skin tumour detection and has been successfully applied in a preliminary clinical trial, the latter regards DNA chips reading and has been tested only at laboratory level, yet it has produced promising results for its future implementation in commercial systems.
Aiming at discerning the role of fluorine from that of nitrogen as a dopant in N,F-codoped TiO 2 , a series of HF-doped TiO 2 photocatalysts were investigated in the decomposition of formic and acetic acid in aqueous suspensions, also as a function of the irradiation wavelength (action spectra analysis), in comparison with recent results obtained with an analogous series of NH 4 F-doped TiO 2 photocatalysts. Visible light absorption around 420 nm, which was found to be inactive in acetic acid decomposition, is definitely shown to be associated with nitrogen doping, whereas the enhanced absorption at ca. 365 nm, increasing with increasing calcination temperature, can be unambiguously attributed to structural modifications induced by fluorine doping. Action spectra analysis confirms that this absorption is active in acetic acid decomposition, in both HF-and NH 4 F-doped TiO 2 photocatalysts. From time-resolved photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy analysis, a clear correlation is outlined between the photoactivity of the materials and the long-lasting component of the PL signal, which increases with the calcination temperature and is related to the formation of surface defects. Thus, fluorine doping, followed by calcination at high temperature, increases the amount of surface traps originating the long-lasting PL signal, which are beneficial in photoactivity by ensuring long-living photoproduced charge couples.
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