Open AccessTomographic fluorescence lifetime multiplexing in the spatial frequency domain
Author(s) -
Anand T. N. Kumar,
Steven S. Hou,
William L. Rice
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
optica
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 5.074
H-Index - 107
ISSN - 2334-2536
DOI - 10.1364/optica.5.000624
Subject(s) - multiplexing , imaging phantom , monte carlo method , time domain , computer science , fluorescence , frequency domain , physics , optics , mathematics , computer vision , telecommunications , statistics
The ability to simultaneously recover multiple fluorophores within biological tissue (multiplexing) can have important applications for tracking parallel disease processes in vivo . Here we present a novel method for rapid and quantitative multiplexing within a scattering medium, such as biological tissue, based on fluorescence lifetime contrast. This method employs a tomographic inversion of the asymptotic (late) portion of time-resolved spatial frequency (SF) domain measurements. Using Monte Carlo simulations and phantom experiments, we show that the SF-asymptotic time domain (SF-ATD) approach provides a several-fold improvement in relative quantitation and localization accuracy over conventional SF-time domain inversion. We also show that the SF-ATD approach can exploit selective filtering of high spatial frequencies to dramatically improve reconstruction accuracy for fluorophores with subnanosecond lifetimes, which is typical of most near-infrared fluorophores. These results suggest that the SF-ATD approach will serve as a powerful new tool for whole-body lifetime multiplexing.