Dr. Mary-Ann Mycek

MAJOR RESEARCH INTERESTS

In my Biomedical Optical Diagnostics Laboratory, our objective is to improve human health through research and education in Biomedical Optics, a multidisciplinary field incorporating elements of the physical and life sciences, engineering, and medicine.

My translational (“bench to bedside”) research program in Biomedical Optics involves developing and applying methods of optical science and engineering to quantitatively probe living cells and tissues, with the goal of impacting patient care via the development of non- and minimally-invasive biomedical optical diagnostic technologies.

To achieve this goal, the research strategy I employ has three major approaches, which proceed in parallel and are closely related to one another: (1) Optical Molecular Imaging (basic, pre-clinical studies on model systems); (2) Clinical Optical Diagnostics (applied, clinical studies on human tissues); (3) Computational Modeling (quantitative, theoretical models of light propagation in tissues).

My research interests include: biomedical optical tissue spectroscopy and imaging; nonlinear and time- resolved optical spectroscopy and imaging methods; ultrafast cellular and molecular imaging and sensing at the micro- and nano-scales; non- and minimally-invasive biological sensing; computational modeling of light-tissue interactions.