A Probe Driven by Miniature Propeller for Intravascular Optical Coherence Tomography

Intravascular optical coherence tomography (IVOCT) is of great significance for early diagnosis of cardiovascular diseases and imaging probes arc the core components of IVOCT systems. For this purpose, an IVOCT probe driven by a miniature propeller was proposed in this paper. Instead of using electric devices such as micromotors that provided power for beam scanning in traditional endoscopic probes, the probe utilized the kinetic energy of the fluid that flushed away the blood in the imaging of the IVOCT system to drive the propeller installed at the probe end, thereby driving the right-angle prism on the propeller shaft to rotate and realizing the scanning imaging of beams for the vessel walls. Moreover, we improved the driving efficiency of fluid by optimizing the design of the propeller. For the probe, the outer diameter is 1.5 mm and the highest scanning speed can reach 191 r/s. Finally, the imaging ability of the IVOCT system integrating the probe was well verified by the clear tomographic images of the samples like white tapes, green onion tubes, and in vitro artery vessels of chicken hearts.