Volumetric stimulated Raman scattering imaging of cleared tissues towards three-dimensional chemical histopathology

Thin tissue slice based histology has been used as a gold standard for disease diagnosis since over a hundred years ago. However, histopathological evaluation on two-dimensional slides suffers from large variations due to limited sampling. To improve the diagnostic accuracy, three-dimensional (3D) histology is performed through serial sectioning, staining, imaging and reconstruction of individual slices, which is highly time-consuming and labor intensive. We developed a volumetric stimulated Raman scattering (SRS) imaging method, which provides histology-like information in 3D context without the need for staining with dyes. Using a small molecule clearing agent, formamide, we performed tissue clearing within 30 min and achieved an imaging depth up to 500 µm in highly scattered tissues, including brain, kidney, liver and lung. Through a two-color SRS imaging scheme, we obtained histology-like images in cleared brain tissue slices. Our method has the potential for 3D tissue histopathology to improve the accuracy of histopathological examination.