Patent ID: 8353833

Claim:
A method for imaging a region of interest, the method comprising: (a) stimulating the region of interest with light from a light source to produce a first set of ultrasound waves through a photoacoustic effect; (b) stimulating the region of interest with ultrasound radiation from an ultrasound source to produce a second set of ultrasound waves reflected from the region of interest; (c) focusing the first and second sets of waves through an acoustic lens to produce focused waves, the acoustic lens being configured such that said first and second sets of ultrasound waves originating at a single time at an object plane in the region of interest are focused onto an image plane and arrive at the image plane at times separated by no more than a time gate width so that all points in the object plane are focused simultaneously; (d) detecting the focused waves in a transducer while applying a time gate corresponding to the time gate width to produce time-gated photoacoustic signals, the time-gated photoacoustic signals providing at least one photoacoustic C-scan at any given period of time, step (d) being repeated multiple times to provide real-time imaging; (e) detecting the focused waves in the transducer while applying a time gate corresponding to the time gate width to produce time-gated ultrasound signals, the time-gated ultrasound signals providing at least one ultrasound C-scan at any given period of time, step (e) being repeated multiple times to provide said real-time imaging; and (f) imaging the region of interest from the at least one photoacoustic C-scan and the at least one ultrasound C-scan provided in steps (d) and (e).