Patent Document ID: 20140371600
Application ID: 14345029
Patent Flag: 0

Claim One:
1. An apparatus for measuring mechanical properties of tissue comprising: a stereo optical surgical microscope comprising: at least one objective lens, an illuminator, and at least a first and a second digital cameras, such that a first digital camera is coupled to provide digital images of the tissue as observed from a first angle, and a second digital camera is coupled to provide digital images of the tissue as observed from a second angle through the at least one objective lens, paired images obtained from the first and second camera forming a stereo pair; a digital image processing system adapted to determine surface topography of tissue from stereo pairs of images obtained by the at least two digital cameras; at least one indenter; and mechanical modeling routines stored in memory of the digital image processing system, the mechanical modeling routines adapted to construct a computer model of mechanical properties of tissue, and fitting parameters of the computer model to measured displacement map obtained by co-registering surface topography of tissue without indenter on the tissue and surface topography of the tissue with the indenter positioned on the tissue.