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Photoacoustic imaging (PAI), also referred to as optoacoustic imaging, has shown promise in early-stage clinical trials in a range of applications from inflammatory diseases to cancer. While the first PAI systems have recently received regulatory approvals, successful adoption of PAI technology into healthcare systems for clinical decision making must still overcome a range of barriers, from education and training to data acquisition and interpretation. The International Photoacoustic Standardisation Consortium (IPASC) undertook an community exercise in 2022 to identify and understand these barriers, then develop a roadmap of strategic plans to address them. Here, we outline the nature and scope of the barriers that were identified, along with short-, medium- and long-term community efforts required to overcome them, both within and beyond the IPASC group.

Non-invasive optoacoustic mapping of temperature in tissues with low blood content can be enabled by administering external contrast agents. Some important clinical applications of such approach include temperature mapping during thermal therapies in a prostate or a mammary gland. However, the technique would require a calibration that establishes functional relationship between the measured normalized optoacoustic response and local tissue temperature. In this work, we investigate how a key calibration parameter – the temperature of zero optoacoustic response (T0) – behaves in different environments simulating biological tissues augmented with either dissolved or particulate (nanoparticles) contrast agents. The observed behavior of T0 in ionic and molecular solutions suggests that in-vivo temperature mapping is feasible for contrast agents of this type, but requires knowledge of local concentrations. Oppositely, particulate contrast agents (plasmonic or carbon nanoparticles) demonstrated concentration-independent thermal behavior of optoacoustic response with T0 defined by the thermoelastic properties of the local environment.

Optoacoustic (OA) microscopy using an all-optical system based on the probe beam deflection technique (PBDT) for detection of laser-induced acoustic signals was investigated as an alternative to conventional piezoelectric transducers. PBDT provides a number of advantages for OA microscopy including (i) efficient coupling of laser excitation energy to the samples being imaged through the probing laser beam, (ii) undistorted coupling of acoustic waves to the detector without the need for separation of the optical and acoustic paths, (iii) high sensitivity and (iv) ultrawide bandwidth. Because of the unimpeded optical path in PBDT, diffraction-limited lateral resolution can be readily achieved. The sensitivity of the current PBDT sensor of 22 μV/Pa and its noise equivalent pressure (NEP) of 11.4 Pa are comparable with these parameters of the optical micro-ring resonator and commercial piezoelectric ultrasonic transducers. Benefits of the present prototype OA microscope were demonstrated by successfully resolving micron-size details in histological sections of cardiac muscle.

In the present work, we present the use of gold nanorods as plasmonic nanoparticles for selective photothermal therapy of human acute (HL-60) and chronicle (K-562) leukemia cells using a near-infrared laser. We improved a published methodology of gold nanorods conjugation to generate high yields of narrow band gold nanorods with an optical absorption centered at 760 nm. The manufactured nanorods were pegylated and conjugated with monoclonal antibody to become non-toxic as biocompatible nanothermolysis agent. Gold nanorods are synthesized and conjugated to CD33 monoclonal antibody. After pegylation, or conjugation with CD33 antibody, gold nanorods were non-toxic to acute and chronic leukemia cells. Our modified gold nanorod CD33 conjugates shown high level of accumulation for both leukemia cell lines, and successful used for nanothermolysis of human leukemia cells in vitro. Each sample was illuminated with 1 or 3 laser shots as for low and for high laser fluence. The radiation was provided by a Quanta Systems q-switched titanium sapphire laser, and the system was designed for maximum sample coverage using non-focused illumination. HL-60 and K-562 cells were treated for 45 min with gold nanorods CD33 conjugated, or with pegylated gold nanorods. The effect of pulsed-laser nanothermolysis for acute and chronic leukemia cells were investigated with cell counting for number of living cells, percentage of cell death and functional parameters such as damage of cell membrane and metabolic activity. Gold nanorods CD33 conjugates significantly increase cell damage for low fluence laser and completely destroyed cancer cells after 3 pulses for low fluence (acute leukemia) and for high fluence laser as for HL-60 (acute) and for K-562 (chronicle) leukemia cells.