Researchers developed and tested a new blood vessel imaging approach that will allow investigators to capture images of blood vessels at different spatial scales, which will speed up imaging-based research in the lab.
The “VascuViz” method, tested in mouse tissues, uses a quick-setting polymer mixture to fill blood vessels and make them visible in multiple imaging techniques. The method allows researchers to see the structure of a tissue’s vasculature. Combined with detailed mathematical models or complementary images of other tissue elements, it can help clarify blood flow’s complex role in health and disease.
The combined images should improve understanding of the biology of diseases involving abnormalities in blood flow, such as cancer and stroke, and the structures and functions of tissues throughout the body.
In the lab, researchers use various techniques, including MRI, CT, and microscopy, to investigate the role of blood vessels. These images can help you understand how tissues develop disease or response to treatment. However, integrating the data in these images has proven difficult because agents that make a blood vessel visible to one method can render it invisible to another. It restricts the amount of information researchers can glean from a single sample.
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