Multiphoton Fluorescence Lifetime Imaging at the Dawn of Clinical Application

So far, reports of clinical applications of time-resolved fluorescence in vivo imaging has concentrated on the human skin, teeth, and the eye (i.e., parts of the body that can be easily accessed). Imaging of the interior of the human eye can be performed with onephoton excitation sources such as picosecond blue laser pulses. There is the hope that FLIM can help to detect early stages of eye diseases, especially age-related macula degeneration (Schweitzer et al. 2004, 2007).