title: Reflection-mode in vivo photoacoustic microscopy with subwavelength lateral resolution.
abstract: We developed a reflection-mode subwavelength-resolution photoacoustic microscopy system capable of imaging optical absorption contrast in vivo. The simultaneous high-resolution and reflection-mode imaging capacity of the system was enabled by delicately configuring a miniature high-frequency ultrasonic transducer tightly under a water-immersion objective with numerical aperture of 1.0. At 532-nm laser illumination, the lateral resolution of the system was measured to be ~320 nm. With this system, subcellular structures of red blood cells and B16 melanoma cells were resolved ex vivo; microvessels, including individual capillaries, in a mouse ear were clearly imaged label-freely in vivo, using the intrinsic optical absorption from hemoglobin. The current study suggests that, the optical-absorption contrast, subwavelength resolution, and reflection-mode ability of the developed photoacoustic microscopy may empower a wide range of biomedical studies for visualizing cellular and/or subcellular structures.
authors.affiliation: Research Laboratory for Biomedical Optics and Molecular Imaging, Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Molecular Imaging, Institute of Biomedical and Health Engineering, Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 1068 Xueyuan Boulevard, Nanshan, Shenzhen 518055, China ; Condensed Matter Science and Technology Institute, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin 150080, China ; Authors contributed equally to this work.
authors.forename: Wei
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Song
authors.affiliation: Research Laboratory for Biomedical Optics and Molecular Imaging, Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Molecular Imaging, Institute of Biomedical and Health Engineering, Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 1068 Xueyuan Boulevard, Nanshan, Shenzhen 518055, China ; Authors contributed equally to this work.
authors.forename: Wei
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Zheng
authors.affiliation: Research Laboratory for Biomedical Optics and Molecular Imaging, Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Molecular Imaging, Institute of Biomedical and Health Engineering, Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 1068 Xueyuan Boulevard, Nanshan, Shenzhen 518055, China ; Authors contributed equally to this work.
authors.forename: Ruimin
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: Research Laboratory for Biomedical Optics and Molecular Imaging, Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Molecular Imaging, Institute of Biomedical and Health Engineering, Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 1068 Xueyuan Boulevard, Nanshan, Shenzhen 518055, China.
authors.forename: Riqiang
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Lin
authors.affiliation: Research Laboratory for Biomedical Optics and Molecular Imaging, Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Molecular Imaging, Institute of Biomedical and Health Engineering, Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 1068 Xueyuan Boulevard, Nanshan, Shenzhen 518055, China.
authors.forename: Hongtao
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Huang
authors.affiliation: Research Laboratory for Biomedical Optics and Molecular Imaging, Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Molecular Imaging, Institute of Biomedical and Health Engineering, Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 1068 Xueyuan Boulevard, Nanshan, Shenzhen 518055, China.
authors.forename: Xiaojing
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Gong
authors.affiliation: Research Laboratory for Biomedical Optics and Molecular Imaging, Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Molecular Imaging, Institute of Biomedical and Health Engineering, Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 1068 Xueyuan Boulevard, Nanshan, Shenzhen 518055, China.
authors.forename: Shousheng
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.affiliation: Condensed Matter Science and Technology Institute, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin 150080, China.
authors.forename: Rui
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: Research Laboratory for Biomedical Optics and Molecular Imaging, Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Molecular Imaging, Institute of Biomedical and Health Engineering, Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 1068 Xueyuan Boulevard, Nanshan, Shenzhen 518055, China ; Beijing Center for Mathematics and Information Interdisciplinary Sciences (BCMIIS), Beijing, China.
authors.forename: Liang
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Song
keywords: (170.3880) Medical and biological imaging; (170.5120) Photoacoustic imaging; (180.0180) Microscopy