Abstract
Photoacoustic imaging has increasing biomedical applications, from fundamental research to clinical translations, due to its high optical absorption contrast and high acoustic resolution in deep tissue. The current implementations of photoacoustic imaging employ either a multi-element ultrasonic array for parallel signal detection or raster-scanning of a single-element detector for serial data acquisition, demanding a trade-off between throughput and cost. Recently a new photoacoustic imaging method–photoacoustic topography through an ergodic relay (PATER) has been developed to address this issue. PATER can provide snapshot wide-field images upon single laser shots with just one single-element detector. Till now, PATER has demonstrated in vivo high-speed monitoring of changes in oxygen saturation and fast matching of vascular patterns for biometric authentication. PATER has achieved high-throughput imaging over a large field of view with a much-simplified and miniaturized configuration. This offers an economical alternative to the array-based parallel imaging system and promises wearable photoacoustic monitoring of human vital signs.
Keywords
Photoacoustic topography, Ergodic relay, Snapshot imaging, High-throughput imaging