People

Recently inducted into AIMBE "for outstanding contributions advancing basic theory and practice in biomedical optics, including optical biopsy, interstitial laser thermotherapy, and optical pharmacokinetics"

Research Interests

• Medical applications of optics, lasers and spectroscopy
• Biomedical Optics and Biophotonics
• Biomolecular dynamics
• Applied spectroscopy, especially to biomedical problems
• Nonlinear optics, quantum electronics and laser physics

Current Research

The core theme of biomedical optics/photonics is minimally invasive optical diagnostics and therapeutics. The current national trend in health care is a growing emphasis on preventive medicine, early diagnosis, reduced invasiveness of procedures, outpatient procedures - in short, an overall reduction in the cost of providing health care. Minimally invasive techniques address such aims in addition to providing significant patient benefits. Current developments in optical technologies are rapidly increasing the technical options available. Moreover, the ongoing growth in use of endoscopes and laparoscopes in medicine makes this theme very timely. Some components of Dr. Bigio's current research:

• Advanced spectroscopic technologies for tissue diagnosis
• Noninvasive measurement of drug concentrations in tissue
• Interstitial laser thermotherapy and photodynamic therapy
• Computational methods for modeling optical transport in tissue
• Multi-capability endoscopic and laparoscopic instruments

Selected Recent Publications

Invited review: “Spectroscopic Sensing of Cancer and Cancer Chemotherapy, current status of translational research” Irving J Bigio and Stephen G. Bown, Cancer Biology and Therapy 3, no.3, 259-267 (2004).

“Optical method for real-time monitoring of drug concentrations facilitates the development of novel methods for drug delivery to brain tissue,” Roberto Reif, Mei Wang, Shailendra Joshi, Ousama Aamar and Irving J Bigio, J Biomedical Optics, 12(3), 034036 (May/June 2007)

“An analytical model of light reflectance for extraction of the optical properties in small volumes of turbid media,” Roberto Reif, Ousama A’Amar and Irving J. Bigio, Applied Optics 46, 7317-7328 (Oct. 2007)

“Elastic scattering spectroscopy as a diagnostic tool for apoptosis in cell cultures,” C.S. Mulvey, A.L. Curtis, S.K. Singh and I.J. Bigio, Invited paper: IEEE J. Select. Topics in Quant. Electron. 13, 1663-1670 (Oct. 2007).

“Analysis of changes in reflectance measurements on biological tissues subjected to different probe pressures,” R. Reif, M.S. Amorosino, K.W. Calabro, O. Aamar, S.K. Singh and I.J. Bigio, J. Biomed. Opt. Letters 13, 010502-1 – 3, (Jan./Feb. 2008)

“Design of a system to measure light scattering from individual cells excited by an acoustic wave,” R. Georgescu, D. Khismatulin, R.G. Holt, J.L. Castagner and I.J. Bigio, Optics Express 16, 3496-3503 (2008)