Oxygen in Action

Gregor Liebsch

EBR January Issue 2012

Planar optical sensors capable of measuring chemical analytes can now be used to map oxygen distributions in animal and plant tissue, and pave the way for breakthroughs in cultivating cell constructs.

The market for digital imaging devices is constantly growing and new products with increased resolution and scaled down size are continually being developed. The use of such devices is also of great interest in the field of chemical optical sensing, where the response of fluorescent sensors is recorded in order to measure chemical analytes. Fluorescent optical sensor foils, combined with imaging technology, allow easy visualization of oxygen distributions and their spatial and temporal changes. This new technology opens up a whole range of applications in all fields of scientific and industrial research.