May 2017
Spotlight Summary by Roarke Horstmeyer
Electrifying catheters with light
While the simple and cost-effective metal wire is now the primary thread that connects us together with all of our devices, there are some places that the standard wire simply should not go. One place, as explored in this work by Martin Pekař and colleagues, is into the human heart. While the metal catheter has been previously used to insert small intracardiac devices into the heart to assist with surgery, the wire’s conductance unfortunately interacts with other radio frequency waves and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) signals. This limits the application of new ultra-small ultrasound transducers, which are currently available to provide crucial measurements of heart shape and movement. To overcome this limitation, Pekař and co-workers have replaced the metal catheter with an optical fiber. Instead of relying on electric signals, they now use light to transmit power into and data out of the body. In their device, laser light powers a micro-machined ultrasonic transducer via a receiving LED, while a connected VCSEL array transforms its ultrasound measurements into light pulses that the optical fiber sends back out of the heart. While the authors have yet to test their new MRI-friendly optical catheter in a clinical setting, it appears to hold significant promise for improving our view into the human body during crucial operations.
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Article Information
Electrifying catheters with light
Martin Pekař, Jeannet van Rens, and Martin B. van der Mark
Opt. Express 25(8) 8534-8549 (2017) View: Abstract | HTML | PDF