Patent ID: 7627208

Claim:
An elongated optical probe to be inserted into a tube which is open at a distal end portion of an insertion section of an endoscope, the probe comprising: a sheath constituting an outer circumferential surface of the optical probe and having a cross section taken perpendicular to the longitudinal direction having a shape that is a triangle and having three side walls; an optical fiber laid in an internal space of the sheath along a longitudinal direction thereof; a deflection scanning means disposed in the internal space of the sheath to deflect light outputted from the optical fiber, and rotatable around an axis line extending in the longitudinal direction to scan the deflected light in a circumferential direction of the axis line; and a plurality of light transmission sections for transmitting the scanning light, each provided on one of the three side walls of the sheath along the circumferential direction and each having an outer surface that is flat.