Optics system reveals tell-tale signs of disease

WASHINGTON – An international team of researchers has developed an advanced optics system that can map out the network of tiny blood vessels beneath the outer layer of the human skin in a non-invasive procedure that has the potential to reveal telltale signs of disease.

The research was published in the Optical Society’s (OSA) open-access journal Biomedical Optics Express.

Researchers from Medical University Vienna (MUW) in Austria and the Ludwig-Maximilians University in Munich, Germany, used optical coherence tomography (OCT) to “see” beneath the surface of the skin using a near-infrared laser to visualize the micro-vessel structure just below the skin surface.

The system was used to map the blood vessels on skin with different conditions, including a healthy human palm, allergy-induced eczema on the forearm, dermatitis on the forehead, and two cases of basal cell carcinoma, the most common type of skin cancer, on the face. The patterns of the blood vessel networks supplying the tested lesions showed significant alterations compared to healthy skin.

According to the researchers, the imaging system shows the most promise for clinical application in the diagnosis and treatment of skin cancer. “We hope that improved in-depth diagnosis of tissue alterations due to disease might help to reduce the number of biopsies by providing better guidance,” said principal investigator Rainer Leitgeb of MUW.