Sebastian Wachsmann-Hogiu

UC Davis, CBST

Biophotonics is an interdisciplinary field at the interface between physics, chemistry, biology, engineering, and medicine, which deals with the use of light in life sciences and medicine. Photons can be absorbed, emitted, or scattered by biomolecules. During either of these types of interactions, the molecule will, under controlled experimental conditions, preserve its integrity. Therefore, photons offer the unique opportunity to identify biomolecules and study the functions they play in their native environment. Taking advantage of a worldwide market of more then $53B, biophotonics has moved from the use of simple tools like transmission/absorption, reflection, or fluorescence to develop new tools, such as multiphoton excitation, Raman, near-field, fluorescence resonance energy transfer, or single molecule fluorescence, to mention just a few. Several applications will be presented, including identification of cancer stem-like cells, cancer detection, gene expression, and in vivo small animal imaging.