Terahertz probe for in vivo imaging
Principal Investigator:
Thierry BLU — Dept. of Electronic Engineering, CUHK
Co-investigators:
Emma MacPherson — Dept. of Electronic & Computer Engineering, HKUST
Louis Cheung — Dept. of Orthopaedics & Traumatology, CUHK
Anil T. Ahuja — Dept. of Diagnostic Radiology & Organ Imaging, CUHK
Collaborator:
TeraView Ltd, Cambridge, UK.
Introduction
Terahertz radiation is strongly attenuated by water and cannot go deep into biological tissues. Thus, for in vivo applications it would be more feasible to conduct measurements in reflection geometry. The terahertz systems used to acquire these data were the original TPI Imaga 1000 (from TeraView), which had an imaging window fixed on the flatbed platform, and then a modified version of the system with a prototype probe attachment.
The probe can allow easier access to objects that cannot easily be placed on the imaging platform. Using optical fibers inside the electric cable, the ultrafast femtosecond pulses from the laser were guided down to the probe, where photoconductive antennas were integrated for both THz emission and detection. The emitted THz beam was focused to the probe tip (a z-cut quartz plate), where samples could be measured.
We have found that the current probe design makes it very difficult to determine which part of the sample corresponds to which terahertz signal and the signal is more noisy. Therefore we propose to design and build a new probe to improve the image registration and reduce the noise. In this way we will be able to further progress the applications investigated in our current SHIAE project.
Related links