In this section
We use light to develop advanced diagnostic tools, wearable sensors, and microscale robots for studying diseases and enabling minimally invasive treatments.
We use photonics to develop new technologies for medicine and to study the pathophysiology of disease. This includes new and improved diagnostic tools as well as microscale robotic devices for therapeutic applications. We use a variety of optical techniques for this purpose such as fluorescence, Raman and diffuse reflectance spectroscopy, as well as microscopy and interferometry. We develop devices ranging from wearable sensors and fibre-optic probes for minimally invasive diagnostics through to microscale robots for cellular-scale manipulation and therapy.
Our research has a number of potential clinical applications including improved monitoring of clinical therapies and interventions (e.g. in inflammatory bowel disease and malnutrition), early diagnosis of infection, and even margin mapping in tumour resection surgery.
The devices we are developing can potentially provide less invasive and lower cost diagnostics. In turn, this may facilitate patient benefits including earlier diagnosis, earlier identification of relapse (e.g. in therapy response monitoring applications), more widespread deployment and more comfortable patient experiences (e.g. through use of less invasive probes and sensors).
Dr Belal Ahmad
Imperial College Research Fellow
Dr Qian Chen
Clinical Research Fellow
Dr Ahmed Ezzat
Research Postgraduate
Dr Nilanjan Mandal
Research Associate in Optical Sensing for LMICs
Dr Alexander J Thompson
Senior Lecturer in Biomedical Sensing
Mr Zeyu Wang
Research Postgraduate
@inproceedings{Coda:2011,
author = {Coda, S and Kennedy, GT and Thompson, A and Talbot, CB and Alexandrov, Y and Munro, I and Neil, MA and Stamp, GW and Elson, DS and Dunsby, C and French, PM and Thillainayagam, AV},
title = {FLUORESCENCE LIFETIME IMAGING FOR LABEL-FREE CONTRAST OF GASTROINTESTINAL DISEASES},
year = {2011}
}
TY - CPAPER
AB - INTRODUCTION: Autofluorescence (AF) has been used to distinguish between normal and diseased tissue, but its molecular basis is still unclear and making quantitative intensity measurements is challenging. Fluorescence lifetime imaging (FLIM) measures the decay rate of the autofluorescent signal from tissue, providing quantitative AF contrast. FLIM has been recently implemented by our group in three endoscopic instruments consisting of a confocal laser endomicroscope, a wide-field fibre-optic endoscope and a single point fibre-optic probe. FLIM has the potential to report on tissue structure and function in real-time during endoscopy, providing a label-free means to detect the early onset of diseases that cause changes in tissue AF. We are developing these 3 modalities for in vivo clinical application, supported by ex vivo studies on freshly-biopsied/resected GI tissues.AIMS & METHODS: The aim of this work is to translate our FLIM instrumentation from the optical bench to in vivo clinical application. AF from 43 endoscopic samples from different GI sites was excited using a conventional confocal FLIM microscope in the range 405-420nm, which is compatible with our FLIM endoscopes, and which is the range needed to excite a number of important endogenous GI tissue fluorophores such as porphyrins, flavins, collagen and elastin. The samples were collected from patients undergoing endoscopy, transported to the FLIM laboratory to be imaged and then submitted for histopathology. The following disorders were investigated: Barrett’s oesophagus, gastric cancer, ulcerative colitis, Crohn’s disease, adenomatous polyps and colon cancer. The accuracy of FLIM in discriminating dysplastic/cancerous samples from normal tissue has been tested by measuring the Area Under the Curve (AUC).RESULTS: Our preliminary data show that premalignant or neoplastic samples display either shorter or longer fluorescence lifetime than that of normal tissue. Increased lifetime val
AU - Coda,S
AU - Kennedy,GT
AU - Thompson,A
AU - Talbot,CB
AU - Alexandrov,Y
AU - Munro,I
AU - Neil,MA
AU - Stamp,GW
AU - Elson,DS
AU - Dunsby,C
AU - French,PM
AU - Thillainayagam,AV
PY - 2011///
TI - FLUORESCENCE LIFETIME IMAGING FOR LABEL-FREE CONTRAST OF GASTROINTESTINAL DISEASES
ER -
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