METHOD OF OPTICALLY IMAGING BIOLOGICAL TISSUES BY USING FLUORESCENCE, IN PARTICULAR FOR DEFINING REGIONS OF INTEREST IN TISSUES TO BE ANALYZED BY TOMOGRAPHY
First Claim
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1. A method of optically imaging at least one biological tissue, the method comprising the following steps:
- a) introducing at least one fluorescent marker into said at least one tissue;
b) exciting said at least one marker by incident light radiations and detecting bands of emission relating to fluorescence emitted by said at least one marker in response to that excitation;
then c) analyzing the intensities of fluorescence relative to said emission bands;
wherein the step b) comprises;
sequentially exciting said at least one marker at n different incident excitation wavelengths λ
i, said at least one marker being adapted to be excited by at least two of these n wavelengths λ
i and to emit in response to each wavelength λ
i a series Si of m simultaneous emission bands Bj having different maximum wavelengths λ
′
j that are substantially the same from one series Si to another (where n and m are independent integers equal to or greater than 2 and where i and j respectively vary from 1 to n and from 1 to m); and
detecting at least two of these series Si that each comprise these m bands Bj emitted simultaneously in order to deduce therefrom in the step c) an estimate of the three-dimensional location of said marker in the tissue(s) and/or the mean absorption coefficients of the tissue(s) for the excitation wavelengths λ
i.
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Abstract
The present invention relates to a method of optically imaging at least one biological tissue, in particular to define areas of interest of tissue(s) to be analyzed by tomography. The method according to the invention comprises the following steps: a) introducing at least one fluorescent marker into the tissue(s); b) exciting the marker by incident light and detecting emission bands relating to fluorescence emitted by the marker in response to that excitation; then c) analyzing the fluorescence in these emission bands; and the step b) comprising:
- sequentially exciting said marker at n different incident excitation wavelengths λi, said marker being adapted to be excited by at least two of the wavelengths λi and to emit in response to each wavelength λi a series Si of m simultaneous emission bands Bj having different maximum wavelengths λ′j that are substantially the same from one series Si to another; and
- detecting these series Si in order to deduce therefrom an estimate of the three-dimensional location of said marker in the tissue(s) and/or the mean absorption coefficients of the tissue(s) for the excitation wavelengths λi.
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19 Claims
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1. A method of optically imaging at least one biological tissue, the method comprising the following steps:
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a) introducing at least one fluorescent marker into said at least one tissue;
b) exciting said at least one marker by incident light radiations and detecting bands of emission relating to fluorescence emitted by said at least one marker in response to that excitation;
thenc) analyzing the intensities of fluorescence relative to said emission bands;
wherein the step b) comprises;
sequentially exciting said at least one marker at n different incident excitation wavelengths λ
i, said at least one marker being adapted to be excited by at least two of these n wavelengths λ
i and to emit in response to each wavelength λ
i a series Si of m simultaneous emission bands Bj having different maximum wavelengths λ
′
j that are substantially the same from one series Si to another (where n and m are independent integers equal to or greater than 2 and where i and j respectively vary from 1 to n and from 1 to m); and
detecting at least two of these series Si that each comprise these m bands Bj emitted simultaneously in order to deduce therefrom in the step c) an estimate of the three-dimensional location of said marker in the tissue(s) and/or the mean absorption coefficients of the tissue(s) for the excitation wavelengths λ
i. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19)
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