Tutorial on diffuse optical tomography

While much of the imaging and disease management is carried out in the x-ray and gamma ray spectrum, there is a clear interest in using optical imaging for some fraction of this, if only a robust approach could be implemented to provide accurate and useful images of tissue. Extensive research has been carried out on diffuse optical tomography and several designs have completed clinical trial testing for bulk tissue spectroscopy and imaging, and work is also ongoing to develop methods that work inside existing clinical imaging systems. Since optical measurements provide molecular-specific imaging, there is the potential for improved specificity of the abnormal tissue relative to the normal. In this tutorial, there will be a focus on Near-infrared tomography for breast cancer imaging, as this has been one application area where numerous developments and trials have been completed, and provides a unique way to image tissue in conjunction with existing clinical systems. This tutorial will review some of the academic and commercial efforts to develop useful diffuse optical tomography systems, and the major clinical trials and their conclusions about utility. The technologies used for this will be outlined and the basic theory of image recovery will be discussed. Advanced methods for hybrid imaging and multispectral inversion will be discussed along with emerging applications in fluorescence molecular tomography. The focus will be on the basic technologies and utilization of them, with future trends in breast cancer, cerebral monitoring, small animal molecular imaging shown.