A hot topic in Optical Tomography is whole-body in-vivo optical imaging of small animals for its utility as a powerful tool for pre-clinical research. However, most commercial and prototype optical imaging systems are a camera based planar imaging systems and they cannot provide multi-directional views and measurement data that can improve the image reconstruction results. Our Small Animal Imager Project focuses on overcoming these issues through the development of a novel whole-body small-animal imager for DOT/FMT, which can provide a simultaneous omni-directional view and angularly-resolved measurements of an entire animal surface. The system can be used for any preclinical applications using DOT/FMT techniques, such as monitoring oxygen levels or detecting fluorescently tagged tumors.
