Instant high-sensitivity non-invasive in-vivo diagnosis during biopsy

Today, doctors have to wait until the tumor grows large enough to become detectable. At this stage, it is often too late to cure. Biopsy, the gold standard in cancer diagnostics, cannot detect tumors in real-time, is often invasive, and frequently misses microscopic-size tumors. The diagnosis takes weeks and is often inconclusive, especially when tumors are microscopic and cannot be detected with other tools. Our novel universal plasmonic nanobubble (PNB) diagnostic system will instantly and directly detect even microscopic-size tumors in vivo, otherwise undetectable, at the tip of a biopsy needle in patient, without extracting tissue, and during standard biopsy procedures.

The unmatched combination of high speed, safety, sensitivity and specificity of in vivo diagnostics with PNBs will turn biopsy into a real-time diagnostic tool and guide the biopsy sampling for more precise and conclusive histopathologic diagnosis. PNB signals support diagnosis automation thus reducing the dependence upon human expertise and allowing an early diagnosis even in low-resource clinics. The PNB system can be used with all biopsy types (needle, endoscopic, open surgery), manual or robotic, primary and intraoperative, to detect solid, lymph node and liquid tumors, and can be applied for diagnosis of various cancers.

Dmitri Lapotko obtained his MS in thermal physics, Ph.D. in laser defense applications from Belarus State University, and Doctor of Science in bioengineering from A.V. Lykov Heat and Mass Transfer Institute. His research in biophotonics and nanotechnology resulted in the invention of laser-generated plasmonic nanobubbles as a novel platform for diagnostic, therapeutic and surgical technologies for cancer and other diseases.