Photoacoustic Brain Imaging: from Microscopic to Macroscopic Scales.
Human brain mapping has become one of the most exciting contemporary research areas, with major breakthroughs expected in the following decades. Modern brain imaging techniques have allowed neuroscientists to gather a wealth of anatomic and functional information about the brain. Among these techniques, by virtue of its rich optical absorption contrast, high spatial and temporal resolutions, and deep penetration, photoacoustic tomography (PAT) has attracted more and more attention, and is playing an increasingly important role in brain studies. In particular, PAT complements other brain imaging modalities by providing high-resolution functional and metabolic imaging. More importantly, PAT's unique scalability enables scrutinizing the brain at both microscopic and macroscopic scales, using the same imaging contrast. In this Review, we present the state-of-the-art PAT techniques for brain imaging, summarize representative neuroscience applications, outline the technical challenges in translating PAT to human brain imaging, and envision potential technological deliverables.
Optical Imaging Laboratory, Department of Biomedical Engineering, Washington University in St. Louis, One Brookings Drive, St. Louis, Missouri 63130, USA.
Junjie
J
Yao
Optical Imaging Laboratory, Department of Biomedical Engineering, Washington University in St. Louis, One Brookings Drive, St. Louis, Missouri 63130, USA.
Lihong V
LV
Wang
Photoacoustic tomography; deep brain imaging; functional imaging; metabolic imaging; molecular imaging; optical absorption contrast; photoacoustic microscopy