Acetic acid enabled nuclear contrast enhancement in epi-mode quantitative phase imaging.

ABSTRACT:

Significance

The acetowhitening effect of acetic acid (AA) enhances light scattering of cell nuclei, an effect that has been widely leveraged to facilitate tissue inspection for (pre)cancerous lesions. Here, we show that a concomitant effect of acetowhitening-changes in refractive index composition-yields nuclear contrast enhancement in quantitative phase imaging (QPI) of thick tissue samples.

Aim

We aim to explore how changes in refractive index composition during acetowhitening can be captured through a novel epi-mode 3D QPI technique called quantitative oblique back-illumination microscopy (qOBM). We also aim to demonstrate the potential of using a machine learning-based approach to convert qOBM images of fresh tissues into virtually AA-stained images.

Approach

We

SUBMITTER: Guang Z 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11792252 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature