Patent ID: 7564546

Claim:
A method of cellular imaging to assess an effect of a drug on a cell, the method comprising: (a) illuminating at least a portion of a cell with substantially monochromatic photons; (b) detecting Raman-shifted photons scattered from the illuminated portion to thereby form an image corresponding to Raman-shifted photons collected substantially simultaneously from a plurality of different spatial locations of the cell; (c) at each of the plurality of different spatial locations of the cell represented by the image, assessing the Raman-shifted photons at a plurality of Raman shift (RS) values characteristic of a pre-selected drug to thereby determine a first state of the cell; (d) after a time period following a first iteration of steps (a)-(c), repeating steps (a)-(c) to thereby determine a second state of the cell; and (e) comparing the first and second state of the cell to thereby assess an effect of the drug on the cell over the time period.