OCT Informs Real-Time Cancer Diagnosis
The origins of optical coherence tomography (OCT), a subsurface imaging technology based on low-coherence interferometry, can be traced to the first decade of the 1800s, when Thomas Young’s double-slit interference experiment showed that light could move as a wave and interfere either constructively or destructively. Since 1991, researchers have explored the use of this phenomenon for medical imaging, with the goal of saving lives in clinics and hospitals. Advancements in lasers, optical detectors, and fast electronics have boosted OCT’s imaging resolution, signal dynamic range, and real-time imaging capabilities.
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Veterinarians Use OCT to Evaluate Eye Health, Cancer Margins, and Joint Strength
Medical doctors have long understood the value of optical coherence tomography (OCT) for monitoring human health. Veterinarians are learning that the technology can be just as vital in evaluating the well-being of patients in the animal kingdom. Often used in conjunction with other technologies, OCT has the capacity to map out tissue at high resolution as a reference point for further experiments and treatments.
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4D OCT Helps to Solve Mystery of Early Embryonic Heartbeat
Scientists from Stevens Institute of Technology and Baylor College of Medicine used 4D optical coherence tomography (OCT) to study the pumping mechanism underlying the developing mammalian heart. 4D OCT allowed them to investigate the functional relation between blood flow and heart wall dynamics within different regions of the embryonic heart at a level of detail not currently accessible by other methods. 4D OCT could potentially enable scientists to assess cardiac pumping over embryonic development as the heart tube remodels, which could reveal functional changes during early cardiogenesis that lead to congenital heart defects.
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