DEVELOPMENT OF DIFFUSE OPTICS FOR BREAST CANCER IMAGING AND MONITORING

该子项目是利用 由NIH/NCRR资助的中心赠款提供的资源。子项目和 研究者（PI）可能从另一个NIH来源获得了主要资金， 因此可以在其他CRISP条目中表示。列出的机构是 研究中心，而研究中心不一定是研究者所在的机构。 乳腺癌是全世界妇女最常见的癌症之一。为了降低 由于乳腺癌导致的死亡率，筛查、诊断 和癌症治疗监测是必要的。 漫射光学成像和光谱学 方法为这些应用提供了新的工具。 光学方法利用非电离 辐射（例如红光到红外光），是非侵入性的或最小侵入性的，并且是廉价的， 技术上简单和快速。这些方法提供了几个唯一的参数， 组织中的功能过程，有可能提高乳腺肿瘤的敏感性和特异性。 组织光吸收系数提供了对血液动力学、总血红蛋白 浓度、血氧饱和度、水浓度和脂质含量。这些组织 在快速生长的肿瘤中，这些特性通常是实质性不同的;例如，高 血氧饱和度低的血红蛋白浓度表明 肿瘤由于其高代谢需求和（有时）灌注差。以不同的 静脉，细胞器数量增加，特别是线粒体或细胞核，有时 伴随着快速生长的肿瘤的更高的代谢活性，并导致 肿瘤的光散射系数增加。最后，光学吸收，荧光， 以及占据血管和血管外空间的外源性造影剂的散射也 提供有用的宣传形式。沿着这些路线，在漫射光学成像的进展， 乳腺癌是利用分子成像领域的进展，一个新兴的领域， 新一代造影剂的开发前景广阔。

This subproject is one of many research subprojects utilizing the resources provided by a Center grant funded by NIH/NCRR. The subproject and investigator (PI) may have received primary funding from another NIH source, and thus could be represented in other CRISP entries. The institution listed is for the Center, which is not necessarily the institution for the investigator. Breast cancer is one of the most common cancers among women worldwide. In order to lower the death rate due to breast cancer, significant improvements in the areas of screening, diagnosis, and therapy monitoring of cancer are imperative. Diffuse optical imaging and spectroscopy methods promise new tools for these applications. The optical methods utilize non-ionizing radiation (e.g. red to infrared light), are non-invasive or minimally-invasive, and are inexpensive, technologically simple and fast. These methods provide several unique parameters based on functional processes in tissues with potential to enhance breast tumor sensitivity and specificity. Tissue optical absorption coefficients provide access to blood dynamics, total hemoglobin concentration, blood oxygen saturation, water concentration and lipid content. These tissue properties are often substantially different in rapidly growing tumors; for example, high concentrations of hemoglobin with low oxygen saturation are suggestive of rapidly growing tumors due to their high metabolic demand and (sometimes) poor perfusion. In a different vein, an increase in organelle population, particularly mitochondria or nuclei, sometimes accompanies the higher metabolic activity of the rapidly growing tumor, and leads to an increase of optical scattering coefficients for the tumor. Finally, optical absorption, fluorescence, and scattering of exogenous contrast agents that occupy vascular and extravascular space also provide useful forms of sensitization. Along these lines, advances in diffuse optical imaging of breast are critical for exploitation of advances in the field of Molecular Imaging, an emerging area of medicine promising development of new generation contrast agents.