Open AccessSpectroscopic intravascular photoacoustic imaging to differentiate atherosclerotic plaques
Author(s) -
Shriram Sethuraman,
James Amirian,
Silvio Litovsky,
Richard W. Smalling,
Stanislav Emelianov
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
optics express
Language(s) - Uncategorized
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.394
H-Index - 271
ISSN - 1094-4087
DOI - 10.1364/oe.16.003362
Subject(s) - intravascular ultrasound , photoacoustic imaging in biomedicine , materials science , photoacoustic spectroscopy , ex vivo , optical coherence tomography , ultrasound , spectral imaging , preclinical imaging , biomedical engineering , optics , medicine , in vivo , radiology , physics , microbiology and biotechnology , biology
The potential of intravascular photoacoustic (IVPA) imaging to detect atherosclerosis was previously demonstrated using a 532 nm nanosecond pulsed laser and an intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) imaging catheter. However, to differentiate vulnerable plaques, the composition of plaques needs to be imaged. Therefore, we introduce a multi-wavelength photoacoustic imaging method to distinguish various types of plaques. Multi-spectral IVPA imaging of ex vivo samples of normal and atherosclerotic rabbit aorta was performed at several wavelengths within 680-900 nm range. The spectral variation of photoacoustic response was extracted and a spectroscopic analysis was performed. The results of our preliminary study suggest that the spectroscopic intravascular photoacoustic imaging technique can be used to differentiate fibrous and lipid components of the atherosclerotic plaques.