Near real time in vivo fibre optic confocal microscopy: sub-cellular structure resolved

We have built a fibre optic confocal reflectance microscope capable of imaging biological tissue in near real time. The measured lateral resolution is 3 micro m and axial resolution is 6 micro m. Images of epithelial cells, excised tissue biopsies, and the human lip in vivo have been obtained at 15 frames s-1. Both cell morphology and tissue architecture can be appreciated from images obtained with this microscope. This device has the potential to enable reflected light confocal imaging of internal organs for in situ detection of pathology.