Physics

Prof. P K Gupta
IIT Delhi

About the speaker: Prof. Gupta is a visiting professor at IIT Delhi, and has made important contributions in optics and photonics related to biomedical applications and tissue optics.  Specifically his work on optical trapping of biological cells and biomaterials has led to greater understanding of light-cell interaction. He was formerly a visiting Professor, IISER, Bhopal; Distinguished Scientist and Acting Director, Raja Ramanna Center for Advanced Technology, Indore and Senior Professor, Homi Bhabha National Institute. Prof. Gupta is fellow of Optical Society of America.

Abstract:

The growing maturity of photonics and the large information processing capability of the present day computers have made it possible to make a comprehensive use of the information content of the light scattered or re-emitted from the tissue for non-invasive, sensitive and high resolution imaging and diagnosis. Photonic approaches also offer a lot of promise for effective management of cancer the incidence of which is growing rapidly because of factors like changes in lifestyle and an increase in the human lifespan. Photonics is not only making it possible to detect cancer at an early stage before it becomes difficult to manage, but is also providing new modalities to treat it with high selectivity. Photonics has also provided means to optically manipulate, in a minimally invasive manner, single cells or sub-cellular objects and measure their mechanical or spectroscopic properties which can in turn provide important diagnostic information.

In the present talk I shall provide a brief overview of some aspects of the work carried out by us in these areas. I shall first describe the use of optical techniques like optical coherence tomography for high resolution biomedical imaging applications and highlight some results of our studies on its use for non-invasive monitoring of the healing of wounds and the cutaneous alterations caused by exposure togamma radiation.  I will next discuss the use of optical imaging and spectroscopic techniques for the screening of the cancer of oral cavity and touch upon the work carried out by us on the use of photodynamic therapy for treatment of tumor in hamster cheek pouch and for antimicrobial and wound healing applications. Finally I shall describe a few representative studies on optically trapped cells and the diagnostic information these can provide.