Patent ID: 8190241

Claim:
A method of imaging a distribution of a near-infrared fluorescent molecular probe within a region of an animal, the method comprising: (a) generating a surface representation of the animal; (b) sequentially transmitting excitation light into the animal at each of a plurality of locations to transilluminate the region of the animal; (c) following illumination at each of the plurality of locations, obtaining an image of fluorescent light emitted from the near-infrared fluorescent molecular probe within the animal; and (d) generating a three-dimensional tomographic representation of the probe distribution within the region of the animal using the images obtained in step (c) and using the surface representation, wherein the surface representation comprises an identification of positions of an incident illumination array and/or detection array arranged on a substrate that conforms to the animal body, and wherein generating a three-dimensional tomographic representation comprises using the identified positions in an optical reconstruction.