Impressions From BiOS 2013

By Doug Malchow, Manager, Business Development, Industrial Products UTC Aerospace Systems (Sensors Unlimited Products)

The SPIE annual conferences, BiOS and Photonics West, recently ended for 2013 with a record number of more than 2,000 technical papers presented on biophotonics methods, systems, and applications. The diversity of applications of optical coherence tomography (OCT) continues to expand, with papers featuring new 3D and even 4D imaging capability in the eye, arteries, and lungs. Raman spectroscopy and NIR spectroscopy had significant sessions for biomedical applications, as did diffuse optical tomography (DOT). It is an exciting time for biophotonics, with new companies thinking out of the box to innovate healthcare diagnostics and solutions. It reminds me of the excitement of the 1990s during the expansion phase of digital telecom, as students graduated from the research labs and began applying their knowledge to real-world problems.