High-resolution, high-contrast mid-infrared imaging of fresh biological samples with ultraviolet-localized photoacoustic microscopy

Mid-infrared (MIR) microscopy provides rich chemical and structural information about biological samples, without staining. Conventionally, the long MIR wavelength severely limits the lateral resolution owing to optical diffraction; moreover, the strong MIR absorption of water ubiquitous in fresh biological samples results in high background and low contrast. To overcome these limitations, we propose a method that employs photoacoustic detection highly localized with a pulsed ultraviolet (UV) laser on the basis of the Grüneisen relaxation effect. For cultured cells, our method achieves water-background suppressed MIR imaging of lipids and proteins at UV resolution, at least an order of magnitude finer than the MIR diffraction limits. Label-free histology using this method is also demonstrated in thick brain slices. Our approach provides convenient high-resolution and high-contrast MIR imaging, which can benefit diagnosis of fresh biological samples.