Advancements in Cancer detection

Today while I was looking for articles I came across one that I found really interesting. A research team from the School of Engineering & Applied Science at Washington University in St. Louis was able to see early-developing cancer cells deeper in tissue. The way they achieved this was using two embodiments of photoacoustic tomography that they developed themselves. Photoacoustic tomgraphy is an analysis technique busing photoacoustic imaging, which uses ultrasonic emissions to take images of the tissue. This method uses red or near-infrared light, as well as sound to take high resolution images. For this method they used a protein called BphP1. According to this article, this protein has the ability to sense different types of light and shift its absorption properties accordingly. This is why they used red or near-infrared light. they subtracted the image created from the red light scan from the infrared light scan and recovered an image that revealed the cancer cells deep in the tissue. This research is important because it provides a way to better detect cancer as well as detect it early. This article was interesting because this method could potentially save lives. However, this method does no good if people do not go to get checked out.

here is the link to the paper. 

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/11/151109134457.htm