Miniaturised imaging probes: bringing optics deep inside the body
Prof. Robert McLaughlin (University of Adelaide, Australia)
Research Seminar
When?
Friday, 6 September 2019, 13:30 - 14:30
Where?
Seminar room ALO 07.100
Gasthuisberg, O&N ALO - KU Leuven
Herestraat 49
B-3000 Leuven
Abstract
Optical imaging technologies, such as optical coherence tomography (OCT), have the potential to acquire exquisitely high-resolution images of tissue and provide surgeons with a new generation of intra-operative guidance tools. However, their limited image penetration depth of only a few millimetres places most diseases beyond their reach. Our team has focused on the development of miniaturised OCT probes. These include endoscopic probes, intravascular probes and needle probes. In this talk, I will give an introduction to OCT imaging and describe our development of a range of new imaging tools, including specific case studies of clinical applications. Recently, we have integrated our probes into brain biopsy needles to enable safer neurosurgery, and have performed our first experiments in humans. In addition, we have developed the first dual-modality needle probes, capable of simultaneously acquiring OCT and fluorescence images, and showed them to be sufficiently sensitive to detect signal from fluorescently-labelled anti-bodies targeted for specific cells types.
Biography
Prof. Robert McLaughlin is Chair of Biophotonics at the University of Adelaide, Australia; and Managing Director of Miniprobes Pty Ltd. Previously, he was a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Oxford. He then left academia for 5 years, pursuing commercial positions in the medical device industry in companies including Siemens Medical Solutions. He was responsible for the development of three commercial products. He returned to academic research in Australia in 2007. He has published 2 book chapters, 76 journal papers and 8 patents, and been awarded over EURO3.5mil in research funding. In 2014, he led the team named WA Innovator of the Year. In 2015, his team were awarded the Australian Innovation Challenge.
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