Fluorescence diffuse optical tomographic (fDOT) system for small animal studies

This paper presents a new fluorescence diffuse optical tomographic (fDOT) system and its associated reconstruction method. It is able to reconstruct the fluorescence yield even in heterogeneous and highly attenuating regions. Furthermore our reconstruction method makes mouse inspection without immersion in optical index matching liquid (Intralipid and ink) possible. Some phantom experiments have been carried out to characterize this new fDOT system and to validate its use for heterogeneous media. A mice study consisting in the follow up of the lungs at different stages of tumor development is then related. These results validate the use of our system for biological studies of small animals.