School of Physics, Tissue Optics and Microcirculation Imaging Group, National University of Ireland, Galway, Ireland; National Biophotonics and Imaging Platform, Dublin, Ireland.
Skin Res Technol. 2014 May;20(2):141-6. doi: 10.1111/srt.12096. Epub 2013 Jul 22.
BACKGROUND/PURPOSE: Vascular abnormalities play an acute role in the pathogenesis of psoriasis. In order to characterize vascular involvement in psoriasis and its regular clinical assessment in vivo, non-invasive high speed imaging with high resolution and high sensitivity is needed.
The correlation mapping optical coherence tomography (cmOCT) technique was used for in vivo microcirculation imaging of human forearm under normal and psoriatic conditions. The cmOCT technique developed by our group uses dense scanning OCT image acquisition and post-processing software based on correlation statistics. The frequency domain OCT system was used for imaging which acquires a 3D volume of 1024 × 1024 A-scans, each of 512 pixels deep in approximately 70 s. The cmOCT technique processes the resulting OCT volume within 116 s using a 7 × 7 kernel.
3D structural and functional (microcirculation) maps of the healthy tissue and the psoriatic plaque were obtained using the cmOCT technique. The presented results indicate that cmOCT allows not only the identification of the microvessels, but also produces more detailed microvascular networks showing how the blood vessels relate to each other in healthy tissue and within the plaque. The microcirculation pattern within the plaque is totally different from the healthy tissue. The distinct changes are also observed in vessel density, tortuosity, and orientation.
The cmOCT provides high sensitivity and imaging speed for in vivo microcirculation imaging within the human skin under normal and diseased conditions.
背景/目的：血管异常在银屑病的发病机制中起着急性作用。为了描述银屑病中的血管受累情况，并对其进行常规的临床体内评估，需要使用具有高分辨率和高灵敏度的非侵入性高速成像技术。
我们小组开发的相关映射光学相干断层扫描（cmOCT）技术用于在正常和银屑病条件下对人体前臂的微循环进行体内成像。cmOCT 技术使用密集扫描 OCT 图像采集和基于相关统计的后处理软件。该频域 OCT 系统用于成像，可在大约 70 秒内获取 1024×1024 A 扫描的 3D 体积，每个 A 扫描深度为 512 像素。cmOCT 技术使用 7×7 核在 116 秒内处理所得 OCT 体积。
使用 cmOCT 技术获得了健康组织和银屑病斑块的 3D 结构和功能（微循环）图谱。所呈现的结果表明，cmOCT 不仅可以识别微血管，还可以生成更详细的微血管网络，显示血管在健康组织和斑块内彼此之间的关系。斑块内的微循环模式与健康组织完全不同。还观察到血管密度、迂曲度和方向的明显变化。
cmOCT 为正常和患病条件下人体皮肤内的体内微循环成像提供了高灵敏度和成像速度。
