Optical resolution photoacoustic microscopy (OR-PAM) is a high-resolution imaging configuration of photoacoustic Imaging. However, due to limited active detection area of ultrasound transducer, the field of view of an OR-PAM is limited to only few millimeter. Researchers have tried to improve the field of view of OR-PAM by implementing the mechanical scanning of the ultrasound transducer, but this has slowed down the speed of imaging significantly. We have developed a very fast, ultra-wide laser scanning photoacoustic system that provides a very large active detection area. The system utilizes a novel spiral scanning mechanism, using traditional 2D galvo mirrors to scan an area of ~4cm in less than 5 seconds. To characterize and demonstrate the imaging capability of the system, we image rat brain in vivo.
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