Neural disorders ranging from brain cancer to Parkinson’s to epilepsy would greatly benefit from new diagnostic tools that noninvasively detect biomarkers linked to abnormal tissue.

Photoacoustic imaging is emerging as a viable complement to the most popular modalities. With real-time 3-D capability, contrast based on optical absorption, and sub-mm spatial resolution, photoacoustic imaging offers attractive attributes for imaging biological tissue. When a near-infrared (NIR) laser source is used, it has an added benefit of excellent penetration into biological tissue of several centimeters.