Side-viewing endoscopic catheter with distal micro rotary scanner for minimally invasive high-resolution intraluminal imaging

微创内窥镜导管正在成为当今治疗各种疾病的基本诊断工具。然而，商业上可用的光纤导管大多是前视的，或者由于固定的视角而能见度有限。我们UBC的研究团队开发了一种新型的微致动器技术，该技术由称为铁磁流体的磁性智能流体驱动，并演示了其在内窥镜导管远端旋转扫描仪上的应用。该I2I项目旨在开发一种侧视导管装置，该装置嵌入所开发的远端扫描仪，用于高分辨率内窥镜成像，具有通畅的周向视野。主动导管尖端将实现高速和逐步扫描，允许使用光学相干断层扫描和导管的其他成像模式。该扫描仪将小型化，以实现小腔内病变的微创诊断，包括冠状动脉、外周肺、泌尿系统和胆道等广泛器官。启用目标设备将消除目前对外部导管旋转装置进行全周扫描的需求，提高成像性能，同时潜在地降低系统成本。初步结果显示，使用动物模型和活体人体组织进行实时成像和分析，结果很有希望。目前的项目目标是将该设备商业化，将其作为第一个具有远端侧视扫描仪的光学导管市场。

Minimally invasive endoscopic catheters are becoming today's essential diagnostic tools to tackle a variety of diseases. Commercially available fiber-optic catheters are however mostly forward viewing or limited in their visibility due to stationary viewing angles. Our research team at UBC has developed a novel microactuator technology enabled by the magnetic smart fluid called ferrofluid and demonstrated its application to the distal rotary scanner for endoscopic catheters. This I2I project aims to develop a side-viewing catheter device that embeds the developed distal scanner for high-resolution endoscopic imaging with an unobstructed circumferential viewing field. The active catheter tip will enable both high-speed and stepwise scans to allow for the use of the optical coherence tomography and other imaging modalities with the catheter. The scanner will be miniaturized to achieve minimally invasive diagnosis of lesions growing in small lumen covering a wide range of organs including coronary arteries, peripheral lung, urinary system, and biliary tract. Enabling the targeted device will remove the current need for an external catheter rotation apparatus for full circumferential scanning, improving the imaging performance while potentially making the system low cost. Preliminary results showed real-time imaging and analysis with promising results using animal models and live human tissue. The current project targets at commercialization of the device, bringing it to the optical catheter market as the first of the kind with the distal side-viewing scanner.