Macroscale fluorescence lifetime (FLT) imaging is emerging as a promising tool to improve tumor margin delineation and enhance contrast between tumor and healthy tissue during fluorescence-guided surgery. We have been developing the tauCAM, a custom-built time-gated CMOS camera with a high quantum efficiency (QE) in NIR (46%) and a resolution of 128x128 pixels, specifically for this application. The images obtained from the tauCAM are overlaid on high-resolution color images acquired with a dedicated color camera. We demonstrate the capabilities of our camera by performing in vivo studies on subcutaneous mice tumor models administered with nanobody- and antibody-based NIR tumor-targeted fluorescent contrast agents. The results indicate that FLT imaging enhances the contrast between tumor and healthy tissue.
Recent studies demonstrated the added-value of fluorescence lifetime (FLT) imaging in tumor identification to intensity-based imaging. The tauCAM is a novel macroscale FLT imaging system that detects the FLT of a fluorophore by measuring fluorescence in the time-domain. FLT images are made simultaneously to fluorescence intensity- and grayscale reflectance images, under ambient illumination. In vivo imaging in subcutaneous tumor bearing-mice revealed that FLT imaging with the tauCAM provides additional information on environmental parameters between tumor and healthy tissue, for tracers sensitive to their physiological environment. This research emphasizes the importance of fluorophore selection for future (pre-) clinical FLT imaging trials.
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