Development of effective rescue countermeasures for toxic inhaled industrial chemicals such as methyl isocyanate (MIC) has been an emerging interest. The conducting airways are especially sensitive to such chemicals, and their inhalation can cause severe airway and lung damage. In an attempt to develop an effective therapeutic agent for MIC, animal models have been evaluated with molecular diagnostics, histological examination, and arterial blood gases. However, direct measurement of the airway structure has not been performed. Our group previously demonstrated anatomical OCT scanning of human proximal airways with endoscopic probes. However, a smaller probe with diameter of less than half a millimeter is required for scanning the MIC-exposed rat trachea. In this study, we acquired volumetric scanning of MIC-exposed rat trachea using a miniature endoscopic probe and performed automated segmentation to reconstruct a 3-D structure of the intraluminal surface. Our miniature probe is 0.4 mm in diameter and based on a fully fiberoptic design. In this design, three optical fibers with core sizes of 9, 12, and 20 um replace the lens, and the angle-polished fiber at the distal end reflects the beam at a perpendicular angle and replaces the mirror. Using automated segmentation, we reconstructed the three-dimensional structure of intraluminal space in MIC-exposed rat trachea. Compared to the non-exposed rat trachea, which had a hollow tubular structure with a relatively uniform cross-section area, the MIC-exposed rat trachea showed significant airway narrowing as a result of epithelial detachment and extravascular coagulation within the airway. This technique could potentially be applied to high-throughput drug screening of animal models.
Access to the requested content is limited to institutions that have purchased or subscribe to SPIE eBooks.
You are receiving this notice because your organization may not have SPIE eBooks access.*
*Shibboleth/Open Athens users─please
sign in
to access your institution's subscriptions.
To obtain this item, you may purchase the complete book in print or electronic format on
SPIE.org.
INSTITUTIONAL Select your institution to access the SPIE Digital Library.
PERSONAL Sign in with your SPIE account to access your personal subscriptions or to use specific features such as save to my library, sign up for alerts, save searches, etc.