High-resolution imaging characterization of bladder dynamic morphophysiology by time-lapse optical coherence tomography

Abstract

We report an experimental study of the possibility of high-speed optical coherence tomography (OCT) for high-resolution imaging characterization of detrusor dynamic morphophysiology and analysis of the mechanisms that lead to geriatric incontinence (GI). The spontaneous contractility of intact fresh rabbit bladders was imaged with two-dimensional (2D) OCT ex vivo at up to 8 frames/s. The time-lapse 2D OCT images were postprocessed by image segmentation and fast-Fourier-transform analysis to characterize the dynamic morphological changes of the bladder contractility. In addition, we studied young and aging rat bladders to analyze the differences in dynamics. Preliminary results of our ex vivo study reveal that time-lapse OCT can track the contractile waves of bladders at high spatial resolution and characterize their dynamic morphophysiology in terms of amplitude, phase, and frequency. The results suggest that time-lapse OCT has the potential to act as a detrusor optical biopsy to enhance the diagnosis of detrusor dysfunction and thus of the mechanisms that lead to GI.

In vivo bladder imaging with microelectromechanical-systems-based endoscopic spectral domain optical coherence tomography

“…In terms of bladder imaging, OCT has demonstrated the great potential to diagnose various bladder diseases, especially bladder cancer. 10,[24][25][26][27][28][29] Implementations of OCT endoscopes using a rotary joint, piezoelectric transducer ͑PZT͒, paired-angle-rotation-scanning probe and microelectromechanical system ͑MEMS͒ micromirror have been reported [30][31][32] for in vivo imaging diagnosis of urinary bladder cancers to fully take advantage of the OCT technique. Since the introduction of MEMS technology to OCT endoscopy, 31 we have recently made substantial improvements on the design and packaging of MEMS-based OCT endoscopes.…”

Time-Lapse Microscopy

“…Fluorescent TLM dating back in 1950s TLM [9, 227] can be used nowadays with fluorescent proteins-reporters [207,[228][229][230][231], fluorescent nanoparticles [232,233] and membrane dyes [160,234,235]. As the further proof of TLM flexibility, we present some reports where TLM is combined with other advanced microscopy techniques: multiplexed or multifield (recording of many fields simultaneously) TLM [236,237], confocal TLM [156,171,207,[238][239][240][241][242], multi-photon TLM [58,[243][244][245], the so-called four-dimensional imaging (three-dimensional images over time) [242,246], time-lapse bioluminescence analysis [247], Forster resonance energy transfer (FRET) microscopy [248], time-lapse optical coherence tomography [249][250][251], in toto imaging to image and track every single cell movement and division during the development of organs and tissues [241] and other innovative approaches [50,252]. TLM can be used to monitor not only cultured cells (cell population and single cell [109] but also living cells in tissue slices up to a depth of 60 micrometers in brain slices, in regions where cell bodies remain largely uninjured by the tissue preparation and are visible in their natural environment [229,253].…”

Optical coherence tomography of the rat cavernous nerves

“…Image resolutions of 1-15 µm can be achieved, which is one to two orders of magnitude higher than with conventional ultrasound. Commercial OCT systems are now being used in the clinic in ophthalmology and cardiology, and recently, experimental studies have been reported using OCT to image a variety of urological tissues [9,10], including the prostate [11][12][13], urethra [11], ureter [11], kidney [11], and bladder [14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21].…”