Optical-resolution photoacoustic microscopy continually monitors macrophages activities of acute inflammation in vivo

Photoacoustic imaging has been developed to image the immune study at the macro scale. Macrophages play diverse roles in the acute response to infection and tissue repair. However, macrophages activities in acute inflammation at the microscopic level still remain challenging. In this work, we proposed optical-resolution photoacoustic microscopy to promptly monitor the labeled macrophages activities in normal and inflammatory groups. The result showed that many labeled macrophages emerged around the vessels firstly, then exuded into tissues, and finally disappeared in the inflammatory group injected with labeled macrophages. In summary, our method allows us to exactly image and track the immune cells of inflammatory diseases.