Yousefi Siavash, Zhi Zhongwei, Wang Ruikang K
Bioengineering Department, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195 USA.
Bioengineering and Ophthalmology Department, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195 USA.
IEEE J Sel Top Quantum Electron. 2014 Mar-Apr;20(2):6800510. doi: 10.1109/JSTQE.2013.2278073.
Lymphatic vessels are a part of circulatory system in vertebrates that maintain tissue fluid homeostasis and drain excess fluid and large cells that cannot easily find their way back into venous system. Due to the lack of non-invasive monitoring tools, lymphatic vessels are known as forgotten circulation. However, lymphatic system plays an important role in diseases such as cancer and inflammatory conditions. In this paper, we start to briefly review the current existing methods for imaging lymphatic vessels, mostly involving dye/targeting cell injection. We then show the capability of optical coherence tomography (OCT) for label-free non-invasive in vivo imaging of lymph vessels and nodes. One of the advantages of using OCT over other imaging modalities is its ability to assess label-free blood flow perfusion that can be simultaneously observed along with lymphatic vessels for imaging the microcirculatory system within tissue beds. Imaging the microcirculatory system including blood and lymphatic vessels can be utilized for imaging and better understanding pathologic mechanisms and treatment technique development in some critical diseases such as inflammation, malignant cancer angiogenesis and metastasis.
淋巴管是脊椎动物循环系统的一部分，它维持组织液稳态，并引流多余的液体和不易回流到静脉系统的大细胞。由于缺乏非侵入性监测工具，淋巴管被称为被遗忘的循环系统。然而，淋巴系统在癌症和炎症等疾病中起着重要作用。在本文中，我们首先简要回顾当前现有的淋巴管成像方法，主要涉及染料/靶向细胞注射。然后，我们展示了光学相干断层扫描（OCT）在淋巴管和淋巴结无标记非侵入性体内成像方面的能力。与其他成像方式相比，使用OCT的优势之一在于其能够评估无标记的血流灌注，这种灌注可以与淋巴管同时观察到，以便对组织床内的微循环系统进行成像。对包括血管和淋巴管在内的微循环系统进行成像，可用于对一些关键疾病（如炎症、恶性肿瘤血管生成和转移）的成像以及更好地理解其病理机制和治疗技术的发展。
