Dynamic optical coherence tomography of small arteries and veins of human fingers

It is demonstrated for the first time to our knowledge that the dynamic optical coherence tomography (OCT) can provide us real-time and high-resolution in vivo imaging of pulsation of a small artery of a human finger in synchronization with the heartbeat. The dynamic OCT shows us an interesting phenomenon that the vessel wall thickness (or the tunica-media thickness) is invariant during the pulsation. Furthermore, the dynamic motion of a small vein was observed under the condition where the upper arm of a volunteer is pressed for temporal obstruction of blood flow. The small vein expands gradually due to blood congestion of fingers caused by the obstruction, while the vessel wall thickness reduces remarkably. The dynamic OCT is thus very useful to find new phenomena in dynamic physiology of peripheral vessels, leading to finding out premonitory symptoms of aging of vessels. (c) 2008 The Japan Society of Applied Physics.