Biomedical Applications of Lasers

Lasers are being increasingly used for biomedical imaging, diagnosis, and therapy. In this chapter we first provide a brief overview of light propagation in tissue. Next we discuss the techniques developed for a more comprehensive utilization of the information content of the light scattered from tissue and how this is helping high-resolution biomedical imaging of tissue microstructure and quantitative, sensitive, and noninvasive diagnosis. The use of lasers for ultraprecise surgery in a minimally invasive manner and also the use of photoactivated drugs for therapy with high selectivity are discussed next. By using illustrations from the work carried out at RRCAT, the chapter also provides a brief overview of the activities at RRCAT in these areas.