UA researchers use holograms as new tool to battle ovarian cancer

August 12, 2009

By hammersmith

[Source: Medicalnewstoday.com] – Two University of Arizona researchers have formed a research team to design, build and evaluate two versions of an ovarian cancer medical imaging and screening instrument that will use holographic components in a new type of optical microscope.

Raymond Kostuk and Jennifer Barton have secured a five-year, $2.4 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to build the instrument that they hope will one day be used to monitor women at high risk for ovarian cancer. Kostuk is the Kenneth Von Behren Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and professor of optical sciences. Barton heads the UA department of biomedical engineering and is assistant director of the BIO5 Institute.

The system is unique in that it will for the first time project multiple spatial images from different depths within a tissue sample and simultaneously provide spectral information from optical markers in order to better identify cancerous cells.

This combined spectral spatial imaging technique shows potential to be much more effective in identifying cancerous tissue sites than by separately using spatial or spectral information.

For more information: Holograms A New Tool In Battling Ovarian Cancer