Jennifer Kehlet Barton

Director, BIO5 Institute

Thomas R. Brown Distinguished Chair in Biomedical Engineering

Professor, Agricultural-Biosystems Engineering

Professor, Biomedical Engineering

Professor, Electrical and Computer Engineering

Professor, Medical Imaging

Professor, Optical Sciences

Professor, Cancer Biology - GIDP

Professor, BIO5 Institute

Member of the General Faculty

Member of the Graduate Faculty

Primary Department

BIO5 Institute

Department Affiliations

BIO5 Institute

Contact

(520) 626-0314

barton@arizona.edu

Work Summary

I develop new optical imaging devices that can detect cancer at the earliest stage. Optics has the resolution and sensitivity to find these small, curable lesions, and we design the endoscope that provide access to organs inside the body. .

Research Interest

Jennifer Barton, Ph.D. is known for her development of miniature endoscopes that combine multiple optical imaging techniques, particularly optical coherence tomography and fluorescence spectroscopy. She evaluates the suitability of these endoscopic techniques for detecting early cancer development in patients and pre-clinical models. She has a particular interest in the early detection of ovarian cancer, the most deadly gynecological malignancy. Additionally, her research into light-tissue interaction and dynamic optical properties of blood laid the groundwork for a novel therapeutic laser to treat disorders of the skin’s blood vessels. She has published over 100 peer-reviewed journal papers in these research areas. She is currently Professor of Biomedical Engineering, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Optical Sciences, Agriculture-Biosystems Engineering, and Medical Imaging at the University of Arizona. She has served as department head of Biomedical Engineering, Associate Vice President for Research, and is currently Director of the BIO5 Institute, a collaborative research institute dedicated to solving complex biology-based problems affecting humanity. She is a fellow of SPIE – the International Optics Society, and a fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering. Keywords: bioimaging, biomedical optics, biomedical engineering, bioengineering, cancer, endoscopes

Publications

An automatic algorithm for detecting stent endothelialization from volumetric optical coherence tomography datasets

Barton, J., Bonnema, G. T., Cardinal, K. O., Williams, S. K., & Barton, J. K. (2008). An automatic algorithm for detecting stent endothelialization from volumetric optical coherence tomography datasets. Physics in medicine and biology, 53(12).

Recent research has suggested that endothelialization of vascular stents is crucial to reducing the risk of late stent thrombosis. With a resolution of approximately 10 microm, optical coherence tomography (OCT) may be an appropriate imaging modality for visualizing the vascular response to a stent and measuring the percentage of struts covered with an anti-thrombogenic cellular lining. We developed an image analysis program to locate covered and uncovered stent struts in OCT images of tissue-engineered blood vessels. The struts were found by exploiting the highly reflective and shadowing characteristics of the metallic stent material. Coverage was evaluated by comparing the luminal surface with the depth of the strut reflection. Strut coverage calculations were compared to manual assessment of OCT images and epi-fluorescence analysis of the stented grafts. Based on the manual assessment, the strut identification algorithm operated with a sensitivity of 93% and a specificity of 99%. The strut coverage algorithm was 81% sensitive and 96% specific. The present study indicates that the program can automatically determine percent cellular coverage from volumetric OCT datasets of blood vessel mimics. The program could potentially be extended to assessments of stent endothelialization in native stented arteries.

Simulations and experiments of aperiodic and multiplexed gratings in volume holographic imaging systems

Luo, Y., Castro, J., Barton, J. K., Kostuk, R. K., & Barbastathis, G. (2010). Simulations and experiments of aperiodic and multiplexed gratings in volume holographic imaging systems. OPTICS EXPRESS, 18(18), 19273-19285.

Using optical coherence tomography to characterize thick-glaze structure: Chinese Southern Song Guan glaze case study

Yang, M., Winkler, A., Klein, J., & Barton, J. K. (2012). Using optical coherence tomography to characterize thick-glaze structure: Chinese Southern Song Guan glaze case study. Studies in Conservation, 57(2), 67-75.

Objective assessment of multimodality optical coherence tomography and second-harmonic generation image quality of ex vivo mouse ovaries using human observers

Welge, W. A., DeMarco, A. T., Watson, J. M., Rice, P. S., Barton, J. K., & Kupinski, M. A. (2014). Objective assessment of multimodality optical coherence tomography and second-harmonic generation image quality of ex vivo mouse ovaries using human observers. DESIGN AND QUALITY FOR BIOMEDICAL TECHNOLOGIES VII, 8936.

Phase-contrast volume holographic imaging system

Luo, Y., de, L. E., Castro, J., Lee, J., Barton, J. K., Kostuk, R. K., & Barbastathis, G. (2011). Phase-contrast volume holographic imaging system. OPTICS LETTERS, 36(7), 1290-1292.

Jennifer Kehlet Barton