A comparison of three different micro-tomography systems for accurate determination of microvascular parameters

The investigation of micro-vessel dimensions in 3D is currently problematic due to their complex structures and fine scale. Quantification of vascular parameters is important in several fields of biomedicine; including embryogenesis, wound healing, diseases characterized by uncontrolled angiogenesis (e.g. tumor growth and metastasis) and the development of implantable bio-materials where a functional vascular supply is critical to their successful integration into host tissue. However, techniques that can resolve the micron-scaled features of these capillary beds, such as scanning electron and confocal microscopy, do not allow for total image reconstitution in 3 D in thick tissue samples [1…