Overcoming Scattering in Light Penetrating Imaging Systems

Researchers from the Institute for Biological and Medical Imaging at the Helmholtz Center in Munich and Northeastern University in Boston have come up with an interesting solution to the old problem of reduced resolution of infrared light when it scatters while traveling through tissue. Using a femtosecond laser and a camera with a shutter faster than the time it takes for many of the photons to scatter, the scientists were able to image photons that arrived earlier than others (i.e. traveled in a more or less straight line), and did the least scattering. This technology will undoubtedly improve the quality of images researchers get using fluorescent protein tagging, as well as other light refracting imaging modalities. The question we have for our physicist audience is whether this concept can be applied to X-ray tomography to improve the resolution of CT scanners.
Read at MIT Technology Review…
Image: Laser light that passes directly through animal tissue (A) is less diffuse than light that the tissue scatters (B). Images made using unscattered light (C) show the localization (red) of a tumor in a mouse more clearly than those made with scattered light (D). They also show the tumor’s extent in the other side of the lung. Credit: National Academy of Sciences