Neurosensory tissue morphology with intraoperative optical fiber probe in aqueous medium

In this work, the author has demonstrated cross-sectional imaging of a retina of an ex vivo fish sample using a common path frequency domain optical coherence tomography at 0.8 μm range. It has been introduced that an integrated surgical hypodermic needle fiber probe can stabilize the flexible glass optical fiber and provides a close proximity to the specimen for intraoperative image guiding. In addition, the light source characteristics were matched to the common path interferometer while operating in the aqueous medium (saline solution), in order to mimic the in vivo condition, in that it shows greater bandwidth and shorter center wavelength for larger input current or output power to sustain the appropriate level of coherence reference peak by the partial reflection at the glass fiber probe interface.