The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) has unveiled an optical coherence tomography (OCT) device designed for primary care physicians.
The handheld scanner can be used to image sites such as bacterial colonies in the middle ear in 3D, or monitor the thickness and health of patients' retinas, according to the institution. The developers believe the device provides doctors a way to quantitatively monitor chronic conditions such as ear infections and possibly make more efficient and accurate referrals to specialists.
The scanner includes three basic components: a near-infrared light source and OCT system, a video camera to relay real-time images of surface features and scan locations, and a microelectromechanical (MEMS)-based scanner to direct the light, according to the university. The device will be presented by UIUC physician and biomedical engineer Dr. Stephen Boppart later this month in Rochester, NY, at the Frontiers in Optics meeting.
Boppart and an international team of collaborators recently received a $5 million U.S. National Institutes of Health Bioengineering Research Partnership grant to further refine the device.
