Recently, Dr. Peng Xi’s lab applied their new technique: laser oblique scanning optical microscopy (LOSOM), to observe mesenteric microcirculatory disturbance in rat. Their paper entitled “Observation of mesenteric microcirculatory disturbance in rat by laser oblique scanning optical microscopy” has been published in Nature Publishing Group’s new journal Scientific Reports.

Ischemia-reperfusion (I/R) injury occurs in a wide range of pathological changes and diseases, including trauma, vascular reflow after contraction, percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty, thrombolysis treatment, organ transplantation, and hypovolemic shock with resuscitation, leading to systemic disorders and high morbidity and mortality outcomes.

The adhension of leukocyte is one of the pathological basis of I/R injury. However, the high absorption coefficient of blood, as well as the similarity of the blood vessel and adhesive leukocyte often causes the visualization of leukocyte very difficult, with poor contrast.

Xi group has used LOSOM technique to enhance the contrast of leukocyte. Comparing with the linear sensitivity to the absorption in conventional microscopy, LOSOM is sensitive to the square of the tissue absorption, therefore the contrast between leukocytes and surrounding blood cells are largely enhanced.

This facilitated both the automatic in vivo cell counting and the accurate measurement of the rolling velocity of leukocytes. Statistical analysis of the different treatment groups suggested that the distinction between I/R and sham groups with time lapse is significant (p<0.05).

Since I/R injury model is essential in the microcirculation study, it indicates that LOSOM has a great potential to be applied widely in future.

Fig.1. Time lapse imaging results of treated and sham groups (a-j), and statistical analysis (k-l).

This work is collaborated with Prof. Jingyan Han, Department of Integration of Chinese and Western Medicine & Tasly Microcirculation Research Center, Peking University Health Science Center.

Dr. Peng Xi is also invited to present their work on OSA’s Novel Techniques in Microscopy (NTM) 2013 conference, together with several world famous professors.

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