Small scale technology with large scale benefits
Posted by Swinburne University of Technology
Early detection is a key to survival for cancer patients. However currently one of the most promising early detection technologies is a massive microscope that takes up two square-metres of floor space and costs $1 million, making it impractical for use in routine diagnostics.
To make this important medical tool more accessible, a team under Professor Min Gu at the Centre for Micro-Photonics at Swinburne has found a way to, in effect, ‘shrink’ the two-photon fluorescence microscope.
They are working to refine the technology and turn the tool into a portable unit; taking it from a technology confined mostly to biological research laboratories and turning it into a powerful diagnostic tool compatible with day surgery.
The two-photon fluorescence microscope creates high-resolution, three-dimensional images from deep within a tissue sample by using ultra-short, pulsed near-infrared laser to induce what is called two-photon excitation. This is a laser light that enables deep penetration of the tissue and three-dimensional imaging without damaging the cells.
There are high hopes that the developments by Professor Gu’s team will greatly improve doctors’ ability to detect early stages of cancer. Researchers say it could improve survival rates for stomach cancer patients from 20 per cent to 95 per cent.
Refining the portability of two-photon microscopy will make the technology far more accessible in clinical medicine, opening the door for more effective disease diagnosis, including access to gastrointestinal cancers. These types of cancers are currently being diagnosed using endoscopy - that is, insertion of a small illuminated camera into the organ - to assist in taking biopsies of the affected area.
Professor Gu says the most important advantage of the two-photon microscopy is the deep penetration through tissue. “So there could be a very attractive opportunity for medical applications if we can make the system smaller and more portable and combine it with an endoscope to achieve in vivo imaging,” he says.
Scientists all over the world have been part of this race to develop a small, portable, endoscopic two-photon microscope and Professor Gu’s team has reached the finish line. Their results, showcased in the ‘hot topics’ section of the premier international optics conference in 2007, show that it is possible to miniaturise the unit, without losing resolution or signal strength.
“The main challenges in making a portable, two-photon endoscope are the efficient delivery of both the excitation beam and the nonlinear optical signals, achieving flexibility and compactness of the probe, and the miniaturisation of its laser-scanning mechanisms,” Professor Gu says.
The team’s novel device uses a special kind of fiber optics, called a double-clad photonic crystal fibre coupler, as well as a microelectromechanical mirror to retain these properties of traditional two-photon microscopy, yet with the compactness and flexibility required for a diagnostic endoscope.
To further develop this portable technology and take it to the clinical level, Professor Gu’s research team have been awarded a three-year Australian Research Council Discovery Grant. This grant, which provides more than half a million dollars in funding, is in collaboration with Dr Alex Boussioutas, a senior lecturer at the University of Melbourne and gastroenterologist affiliated with the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre and the Western Hospital.
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