Paper
23 October 2018 Photoacoustic imaging with custom-designed fingertip laser diode
Author Affiliations +
Abstract
Photoacoustic (PA) imaging has attracted increasing research interest in recent years due to its unique merit of combining light and sound. Enabling deep tissue imaging with high ultrasound spatial resolution and optical absorption contrast, PA imaging has been applied in various application scenarios including anatomical, functional and molecular imaging. However, the bulky and expensive laser source is one of the key bottlenecks that needs to address for further compact system development. Photoacoustic imaging system based on low-cost laser diode is one of the promising solutions. In this paper, we report a custom-made fingertip laser diode system enabling both pulsed and continuous modulation modes with the shortest pulse width of 30 ns, driving current of 10 A, and single modulation frequency of 3 MHz, which is suitable for both time and narrow-band frequency domain PA imaging. The experiments for generating PA signals were performed with more than 70 millivolts signals amplitude. By sweeping the pulse width, it is observed that the amplitude of PA signals is increasing due to higher laser energy. To the best of our knowledge, this may be the most compact laser source used for photoacoustic applications for PA imaging. Owing to its super-compact size, the reported laser diode system could pave the pathway to low-cost photoacoustic sensing and imaging device, even wearable photoacoustic biomedical sensors.
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Hongtao Zhong, Tingyang Duan, Hengrong Lan, Meng Zhou, Jiayao Zhang, and Fei Gao "Photoacoustic imaging with custom-designed fingertip laser diode", Proc. SPIE 10820, Optics in Health Care and Biomedical Optics VIII, 108202U (23 October 2018); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2501168
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KEYWORDS
Imaging systems

Semiconductor lasers

Modulation

Photoacoustic imaging

Pulsed laser operation

Signal to noise ratio

Laser systems engineering

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