Conference Summary
Biomedical Optics (BIOMED) Topical Meeting and Tabletop Exhibit
March 16-19, 2008, St. Petersburg, Florida

Timothy Troutman
PhD Candidate
Biomedical Engineering GIDP

My recent attendance of the BIOMED Optics and Photonics conference was a great experience. Additionally, I feel that it was one of the best conference talks that I have given to date. The location was great, especially for this time of year. I had never been to Florida before, and I was able to see several types of common Florida weather over the course of my stay (quite beautiful this time of year). Unfortunately, I did not find any time to go sailing, but that isn’t what traveling to conferences is typically about. Having now given several podium talks I felt very comfortable with my material and with presenting it to a large audience.

My talk was titled: “Biodegradable Nanoshells for Optical Contrast and Controlled Release.” It was scheduled as the third talk of the conference, first thing in the morning after I arrived late the day before. I stayed up late the night before preparing, both practicing the talk and getting my suit worthy of wearing. Unfortunately the morning came three hours early, since I was now on Eastern Time. In Arizona time, I woke up at 2:30 in the morning to give a talk at 6 am. Despite this, everything went well. The first talk of my session was given by Dr. Konstantin Sokolov, who gave an excellent review of the state of plasmon resonant particles in the field of medical imaging. He emphasized the need for biodegradable plasmonics, as in their current state they cannot be used in clinical applications since they cannot be cleared. This was a wonderful introduction to my talk, as this was exactly the work that I had performed. I was then able to spend more time discussing the actual project rather than spend time justifying it.

The work that I presented truly has the capacity to revolutionize the way in which we image cancer as well as the way that we treat it. With the ability to interrogate a tissue sample with innocuous levels of light in several modalities to find these particles that are targeted to tumors, as well as either mediate low-energy laser induced breakdown, or to release encapsulated contents combines all of the benefits of years of work with liposomes for triggered drug delivery with the imaging and therapeutic capacity of plasmonics, all the while satisfying the most rigorous and necessary requirement: suitability for use in vivo.

My session was a minor part of much broader realm of science, particularly optics. So this experience helped not to better the understanding my field, but rather to increase the breadth of my knowledge in other research fields. I was able to attend some of the holography sessions when there was down-time in my portion of the conference, and while some of the optics was beyond my grasp, I learned quite a bit about the design, functionality, and applications to which this technology is being applied.

In all, the opportunity to present my work at this conference as I reach the conclusion of my studies is truly a capstone. Disseminating the work that has kept me busy for the last four years while being among and respected by scientists at the top of my field is immeasurably rewarding. The fact that it was recognized as being as important and revolutionary as it is satisfying and I would like to thank the Graduate Interdisciplinary Programs for funding part of my expenses for this trip through the Herbert E. Carter Travel Award.