Annegret Umann develops a system that combines optical coherence tomography and autofluorescence.

We warmly congratulate Annegret Umann on the successful completion of her master’s thesis! Her work focused on the development of a multimodal imaging system that combines two powerful techniques: optical coherence tomography (OCT) and autofluorescence imaging.

While OCT provides high-resolution 3D images but no functional information, autofluorescence allows insights into the biochemical and metabolic properties of tissue – but without depth information. The combination of both modalities opens up the possibility of simultaneously capturing both morphological and functional parameters. The developed benchtop system allows data to be obtained from a large field of view. In addition to OCT and autofluorescence, a bright field channel is also integrated. Furthermore, the setup offers potential for use in research projects such as OptoCarDi, which is working on minimally invasive catheter systems for the diagnosis of heart muscle inflammation.