title: Monitoring airway mucus flow and ciliary activity with optical coherence tomography.
abstract: Muco-ciliary transport in the human airway is a crucial defense mechanism for removing inhaled pathogens. Optical coherence tomography (OCT) is well-suited to monitor functional dynamics of cilia and mucus on the airway epithelium. Here we demonstrate several OCT-based methods upon an actively transporting in vitro bronchial epithelial model and ex vivo mouse trachea. We show quantitative flow imaging of optically turbid mucus, semi-quantitative analysis of the ciliary beat frequency, and functional imaging of the periciliary layer. These may translate to clinical methods for endoscopic monitoring of muco-ciliary transport in diseases such as cystic fibrosis and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27599,  USA ; Biomedical Research Imaging Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27599,  USA.
authors.forename: Amy L
authors.initials: AL
authors.lastname: Oldenburg
authors.forename: Raghav K
authors.initials: RK
authors.lastname: Chhetri
authors.forename: David B
authors.initials: DB
authors.lastname: Hill
authors.forename: Brian
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Button