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Scanning fiber endoscopy with highly flexible, 1 mm catheterscopes for wide‐field, full‐color imaging
Author(s) -
Lee Cameron M.,
Engelbrecht Christoph J.,
Soper Timothy D.,
Helmchen Fritjof,
Seibel Eric J.
Publication year - 2010
Publication title -
journal of biophotonics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.877
H-Index - 66
eISSN - 1864-0648
pISSN - 1864-063X
DOI - 10.1002/jbio.200900087
Subject(s) - endoscope , biomedical engineering , endoscopy , imaging technology , optical fiber , fiber , medicine , medical physics , computer science , materials science , radiology , telecommunications , composite material
In modern endoscopy, wide field of view and full color are considered necessary for navigating inside the body, inspecting tissue for disease and guiding interventions such as biopsy or surgery. Current flexible endoscope technologies suffer from reduced resolution when device diameter shrinks. Endoscopic procedures today, using coherent fiber‐bundle technology on the scale of 1 mm, are performed with such poor image quality that the clinician's vision meets the criteria for legal blindness. Here, we review a new and versatile scanning fiber‐imaging technology and describe its implementation for ultrathin and flexible endoscopy. This scanning fiber endoscope (SFE) or catheterscope enables high‐quality, laser‐based, video imaging for ultrathin clinical applications, while also providing new options for in vivo biological research of subsurface tissue and high resolution fluorescence imaging. (© 2010 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)