Review of diverse optical fibers used in biomedical research and clinical practice

Abstract

Optical fiber technology has significantly bolstered the growth of photonics applications in basic life sciences research and in biomedical diagnosis, therapy, monitoring, and surgery. The unique operational characteristics of diverse fibers have been exploited to realize advanced biomedical functions in areas such as illumination, imaging, minimally invasive surgery, tissue ablation, biological sensing, and tissue diagnosis. This review paper provides the necessary background to understand how optical fibers function, to describe the various categories of available fibers, and to illustrate how specific fibers are used for selected biomedical photonics applications. Research articles and vendor data sheets were consulted to describe the operational characteristics of conventional and specialty multimode and single-mode solid-core fibers, double-clad fibers, hard-clad silica fibers, conventional hollow-core fibers, photonic crystal fibers, polymer optical fibers, side-emitting and side-firing fibers, middle-infrared fibers, and optical fiber bundles. Representative applications from the recent literature illustrate how various fibers can be utilized in a wide range of biomedical disciplines. In addition to helping researchers refine current experimental setups, the material in this review paper will help conceptualize and develop emerging optical fiber-based diagnostic and analysis tools.