Robotic Optical Coherence Tomography with multi Angle, Extended area Imaging
Optical Coherence Tomography (OCT) is an established imaging modality for visualization of microstructures in biological tissues. However, its limited field of view (FOV) and depth penetration often hinder the comprehensive assessment of large samples. In this work, we present a robotic OCT (R-OCT) system to extend the imaging FOV by moving the OCT probe with a 7 degree of freedom robot manipulator. The system adjusts the distance between the probe and the sample in real-time for optimal focusing. It leverages multi-angle scans to capture steep edges of the sample which otherwise won’t be covered due to limited depth penetration. We conducted an experiment imagining a custom phantom (96 mm by 40 mm in dimension) using our system. Results show that the R-OCT system can accurately recover the complete shape of the phantom with a reconstruction error of <0.5 mm. The structural features of the phantom are well preserved with multi-angle scans. These results demonstrate the feasibility of using robot assistance to enhance the imaging capability of OCT systems.
Advisor: Professor Haichong Zhang (WPI)
Committee: Professor Giovanni Pittiglio (WPI) and Professor Vincent Aloi (WPI)