Optical Imaging of Primary Tumors

The rapidly emerging field of optical imaging of tumors is an exciting area of translational research. A search in PubMed for “clinical optical imaging in cancer” reveals that the first article published was in 1964 and almost half of all the articles have been published in the last 5 years. Fluorescent probes and mechanisms to target them to cancer cells were developed for in vitro experiments and rodent models of cancer. However, with improvements in hardware, targeting agents, and fluorescent agents, optical imaging is rapidly gaining new and expanded applications in preclinical and clinical research. At the forefront of this field is the discovery of monoclonal antibodies as targeting agents and fluorescent markers that can reliably be conjugated to proteins, while minimizing interference from background fluorescence. Further sophistication and flexibility of imaging systems have and will allow these techniques to move further into the clinical realm. In this chapter, we will review the basic aspects of cancer optical imaging, including therapeutic, diagnostic, and surgical applications.