Imaging the subcellular structure of human coronary atherosclerosis using micro–optical coherence tomography

Abstract

Progress in understanding, diagnosis, and treatment of coronary artery disease (CAD) has been hindered by our inability to observe cells and extracellular components associated with human coronary atherosclerosis in situ. The current standards for microstructural investigation, histology and electron microscopy, are destructive and prone to artifacts. The highest resolution intracoronary imaging modality, optical coherence tomography (OCT), has a resolution of ~10μm, which is too coarse for visualizing most cells. Here we report a new form of OCT, termed μOCT that has an order of magnitude improved resolution. We show that μOCT images of cadaver coronary arteries provide clear pictures of cellular and subcellular features associated with atherogenesis, thrombosis, and response to interventional therapy. These results suggest that μOCT can complement existing diagnostic techniques for investigating atherosclerotic specimens today and may in the future become a useful tool for cellular and subcellular characterization of the human coronary wall in vivo.

Nanosensitive optical coherence tomography for the study of changes in static and dynamic structures

“…The traditional way to increase the resolution and sensitivity consists, according to formula (9), in increasing the spectral range; however, it is impossible to attain the nanosensitivity in this case. Instead, we have proposed a completely new solution [32].…”

Handheld high-throughput plasmonic biosensor using computational on-chip imaging

“…Similarly, various point-of-care diagnostic devices have been developed and among them optical imaging and sensing techniques are highly advantageous as they can provide real-time, highresolution and highly sensitive quantitative information, potentially assisting rapid and accurate diagnosis. [30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40] To date, a number of optical techniques have been proposed for point-of-care diagnostics such as in vitro optical devices, [41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50][51][52][53] including portable optical imaging systems, optical microscopes integrated to cell phones or in vivo optical devices, [54][55][56][57][58][59][60][61][62][63] involving confocal microscopy, microendoscopy and optical coherence tomography techniques. Among these approaches, lens-free computational on-chip imaging 64 has been an emerging technique that can eliminate the need for bulky and costly optical components while also preserving (or even enhancing in certain cases) the image resolution, field of view and sensitivity.…”

Optical Coherence Tomography for Quantitative Diagnosis in Nasopharyngeal carcinoma

“…Optical coherence tomography (OCT) can function as a type of "optical biopsy", enabling visualization of tissue microstructure with a resolution approaching that of histology, but without the need for tissue excision and processing [21] . shaped nuclei with a higher refractive index and more active mitochondria [23] , the component distribution is not homogeneous any more.…”