The diagnosis of diseases based in internal organs often relies on biopsy samples collected from affected regions. But collecting such samples is highly error-prone due to the inability of current endoscopic imaging techniques to accurately visualize sites of disease. The conventional optical elements in catheters used to access hard-to-reach areas of the body, such as the gastrointestinal tract and pulmonary airways, are prone to aberrations that obstruct the full capabilities of optical imaging.
Now, experts in endoscopic imaging at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and pioneers of flat metalens technology at the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS), have teamed up to develop a new class of endoscopic imaging catheters - termed nano-optic endoscopes - that overcome the limitations of current systems.
The research is described in Nature Photonics.
"Clinical adoption of many cutting-edge endoscopic microscopy modalities has been hampered due to the difficulty of designing miniature catheters that achieve the same image quality as bulky desktop microscopes," said Melissa Suter, an assistant professor of Medicine at MGH and Harvard Medical School (HMS) and co-senior author of the paper. "The use of nano-optic catheters that incorporate metalenses into their design will likely change the landscape of optical catheter design, resulting in a dramatic increase in the quality, resolution, and functionality of endoscopic microscopy. This will ultimately increase clinical utility by enabling more sophisticated assessment of cell and tissue microstructure in living patients."
"Metalenses based on flat optics are a game changing new technology because the control of image distortions necessary for high resolution imaging is straightforward compared to conventional optics, which requires multiple complex shaped lenses," said Federico Capasso, the Robert L. Wallace Professor of Applied Physics and Vinton Hayes Senior Research Fellow in Electrical Engineering at SEAS and co-senior author of the paper. "I am confident that this will lead to a new class of optical systems and instruments with a broad range of applications in many areas of science and technology"
"The versatility and design flexibility of the nano-optic endoscope significantly elevates endoscopic imaging capabilities and will likely impact diagnostic imaging of internal organs," said Hamid Pahlevaninezhad, Instructor in Medicine at MGH and HMS and co-first author of the paper. "We demonstrated an example of such capabilities to achieve high-resolution imaging at greatly extended depth of focus."
