| Angiogenesis plays an important role in tumor growth and metastasis. However, only vessels lager than 200μm in diameter can be observed using conventional medical imaging system. Synchrotron radiation (SR) phase contrast imaging, whose spatial resolution can reach 1μm, as the highest, has great advantages in imaging soft tissue structure, such as blood vessels and tumors.In this study, BALB/c nude mouse with Lewis lung cancer implanted was studied using Shanghai Synchrotron Radiation Facility. The images clearly showed the differences between the tumor tissue and the normal lung tissue. The effect of the object-detector distance and energy level on the phase contrast difference was investigated, in good agreement with the theory of in-line phase contrast imaging. Moreover, 3D tumor angiogenesis of lung cancer was obtained for the first time through reconstruction and using contrast agent, demonstrating the feasibility of micro-angiography with synchrotron radiation for imaging tumor angiogenesis deep inside the body. Meanwhile, angiogenesis in tumor chamber was imaged using SR in-line phase contrast imaging without contrast agent, showing that vessels less than 30μm in diameter can be observed.On the other hand, computer simulation of in line phase contrast imaging was adopted to study the influences of energy level, imaging distance and thickness of sample on the image quality. The simulation results, in good accordance with the experiment results, showed that image contrast decreased when energy increased and the thickness of sample did not obviously affect the image quality and the image contrast first increased along with the distance then decreased in a longer distance.The above results showed the feasibility of observation of micro-vessels in tumor using synchrotron radiation in line phase contrast imaging. Further study on the pathogenesis, diagnosis and treatment of tumor by establishing animal models will be investigated. |
PDF Full Text Request