Wide-field pathology imaging using on-chip microscopy.

Abstract

As the primary imaging tool to assist the examination of pathological samples, the conventional light microscope suffers from limited throughput, relatively high cost, bulky size, lack of portability, and requirement for focus adjustment. All of these drawbacks partially limit the use of light microscopy tools in resource-limited settings. Lens-free on-chip microscopy can help to address these drawbacks and achieve high-throughput pathology slide imaging without using lenses or objectives. Here, we review the performance of this lens-free imaging platform by showing examples of its performance with various samples including normal and sickle-cell disease blood smears and human carcinoma of the breast. This lens-free computational microscopy platform is a promising tool that can serve high-throughput pathology needs especially in resource-poor settings.