Boston Chapter of the IEEE Photonics Society

Abstract:  Biomedical applications of optics have played a central role in oncology through endoscopy and laparoscopy imaging, and increasingly now in novel surgical microscopy tools, have become state of the art in certain cancers, and can include robotic guided surgery.  Acceptance of biomedical optics has been widespread in gastroenterology and surgery, because of their role in detecting and treating tissue surfaces, there is a growing role for diagnostic subsurface imaging with optics, although this is largely at the research and development stage now.  This talk with discuss state of the art procedures in biomedical optics and how they are now incorporating more esoteric optical measurements such as molecular fluorescent reporters and higher order effects such as Raman scatter.  The advances in molecular specific probes, which are coming now, will make the difference between successful and unsuccessful procedures, and there is clearly a niche role in surgical microscopy which will always be at the forefront of trying out and accepting new procedures.    

The talk will also focus on oncology research and new developments in hybrid imaging systems which allow both structural and functional imaging of tumors in vivo.  The role of tracking response to therapy and providing a technological pathway to better understand molecular signaling in vivo is discussed.  Hybrid optical imaging is shown to be combined with magnetic resonance imaging, computed tomography imaging, and ultrasound imaging, in three different pre-clinical systems.  While the preclinical market is not nearly as large as the clinical one, it does provide the tools which researchers will adopt, and forms a testbed for new devices which may advance towards clinical development.

Biography:  Brian W. Pogue, Ph.D. is and Dean of Graduate Studies at Dartmouth College and a Professor of Engineering Sciences at the Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth.  He has B.Sc and M.Sc degrees in Physics from York University and a Ph.D. in Medical Physics from McMaster University, in Canada.  He holds a Research Scientist appointment through the Wellman Center for Photomedicine at the Massachusetts General Hospital, and has published over 300 papers and abstracts in the areas of biomedical optics, diffuse spectral tomography, breast cancer and photodynamic therapy of cancer.  His research is funded through two program grants and several individual grants from the National Cancer Institute. He is Deputy Editor for the journal Optics Letters for the OSA.  He is also on the editorial boards of Medical Physics, the Journal of Biomedical Optics, and the Journal of Photochemistry and Photobiology B, and is a Program Chair for the upcoming European Conference on Biomedical Optics, in June 2009 in Munich.

Location:  MIT Lincoln Laboratory