REVIEW article
Front. Med. Eng.
Sec. Advanced Technologies for Medicine
Volume 3 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fmede.2025.1607453
This article is part of the Research TopicRevolutionizing Precision in Breast-Conserving Surgery: A Deep Dive into Emerging Imaging TechnologiesView all 3 articles
Confocal Fluorescence Microscopy for Real-Time Breast Cancer Diagnosis: Current Advances and Future Perspectives
Provisionally accepted
- 1The Hamlyn Centre, Imperial College London, London, England, United Kingdom
- 2Imperial College London, London, United Kingdom
- 3Breast Unit, Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust, Charing Cross Hospital, Fulham Palace Road, London W6 8RF, United Kingdom
- 4Department of Histopathology, Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust, London, United Kingdom
- 5Department of Surgery and Cancer, Faculty of Medicine, Imperial College London, London, England, United Kingdom
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Confocal fluorescence microscopy (CFM) is a powerful optical biopsy technique which captures cellular resolution images of the tissue surface without the need for tissue fixation or sectioning. The evolution of CFM with miniaturization and fibre-based optics now allows rapid capture of wide field images with microscopic resolution. For in-situ diagnostics, there is growing evidence that CFM systems could rapidly and accurately identify breast cancer with clinically actionable results.This comprehensive review discusses different technological advances in CFM systems and explores emerging trends in Artificial Intelligence (AI) and robotic integration in breast cancer imaging. The review further discusses the clinical implications of these technologies, including their potential to reduce re-excision 1 Vyas et al.
Keywords: confocal laser microscopy, Confocal endomicroscopy, breast cancer, breast conserving surgery, fluorescence, Resection margins, margin assessment technology, intra-operative imaging Frontiers 2
Received: 07 Apr 2025; Accepted: 18 Aug 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Vyas, Ezzat, Holford, Ramakrishnan and Leff. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Daniel Richard Leff, Breast Unit, Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust, Charing Cross Hospital, Fulham Palace Road, London W6 8RF, United Kingdom
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.