Photoacoustic is an emerging biomedical imaging modality, which allows imaging optical absorbers in the tissue by acoustic detectors (light in - sound out). Such a technique has an immense potential for clinical translation since it allows high resolution, sufficient imaging depth, with diverse endogenous and exogenous contrast, and is free from ionizing radiation. In recent years, tremendous developments in both the instrumentation and imaging agents have been achieved. These opened avenues for clinical imaging of various sites allowed applications such as brain functional imaging, breast cancer screening, diagnosis of psoriasis and skin lesions, biopsy and surgery guidance, the guidance of tumor therapies at the reproductive and urological systems, as well as imaging tumor metastases at the sentinel lymph nodes. Here we survey the various clinical and pre-clinical literature and discuss the potential applications and hurdles that still need to be overcome.

光声是一种新兴的生物医学成像方式，它允许通过声学探测器（光输入 - 声音输出）对组织中的光学吸收体进行成像。这种技术在临床转化方面具有巨大的潜力，因为它具有高分辨率、足够的成像深度、具有多种内源性和外源性对比度，并且不受电离辐射。近年来，仪器和显像剂都取得了巨大的发展。这些为不同部位的临床成像开辟了途径，允许诸如脑功能成像、乳腺癌筛查、牛皮癣和皮肤病变诊断、活检和手术指导、生殖和泌尿系统肿瘤治疗指导以及肿瘤成像等应用前哨淋巴结转移。在这里，我们调查了各种临床和临床前文献，并讨论了潜在的应用和仍需要克服的障碍。