Abstract 14238: Label-free Imaging of Human Heart by Raman Microspectroscopy

Introduction: The accurate elucidation of myocardial viability is a critical issue in determining the resection region of cardiac tissue in surgical ventricular restoration (SVR). In general, the myocardial viability is evaluated before the operation by using MRI and myocardial scintigraphy. These methods are difficult to apply for real time evaluation of the myocardial viability during the SVR operation. Raman spectroscopy is an ideal and valuable analytical tool in biological and medical fields, allowing identification of states of tissue via detecting molecular vibrations of intrinsic molecules in the tissue without labels or extensive preparations. In this study, we evaluated a new method of human cardiac tissue to identify cardiomyocytes from fibrotic tissue by Raman microspectroscopy for the first time. Method: Cardiac tissues were resected from five ischemic cardiomyopathy patients who underwent SVR. The resection stumps were immediately snap-frozen in liquid nitrogen and were sliced into 5-um-thic...