Topic: Scattered light and deep tissue optics

Informant: Puxiang Lai (Lai Puxiang, Professor, Hong Kong Polytechnic University)

Reporting time: Thursday, May 7, 2026, 10: 30-12: 00 am.

Address: Meeting Room 201, Building 19, School of Mechanical and Automotive Engineering

Organizer: School of Mechanical and Automotive Engineering

Brief introduction of the speaker:

Professor Lai Puxiang has long been committed to the regulation of scattered light and the optical research of deep biological tissues, and has carried out a series of original and forward-looking work in the fields of photoacoustic imaging, scattered light focusing, optical imaging, computational optics, medical imaging, artificial intelligence and so on. He has published more than 140 papers in internationally renowned academic journals such as Nature Photonics, Nature Communications, Science Advances, The Innovation, eLight, Light: Science and Applications. He was invited to give more than 90 academic reports and invited reports around the world, and won the honor of the best paper in international conferences for many times. Professor Lai was selected into the National High-level (Youth) Talent Program in 2016, and Hong Kong's outstanding young scholars in 2016-2017 were selected into the list of Top 2 Scientists in the World of Stanford University. At present, he is the director of the World Society of Chinese Biomedical Engineering, the director of Hong Kong Branch of China Laser Magazine, the member of the Standing Committee of chinese optical society Biomedical Photonics Branch and other social organizations, and the deputy editor-in-chief or editor-in-chief of many outstanding academic journals such as The Innovation, Visual Computing for Industry, Biomedicine, and Art (VCIBA), Advanced Photonics Nexus and Advanced Imaging.

Summary of report:

Optics plays an increasingly important role in modern biomedicine. It is a valuable but challenging goal to control the scattered light and turn it into practical application. This report will review our research process in the past ten years: through the integration of photoacoustic technology, optical wavefront shaping, computing and artificial intelligence, we are committed to achieving high-resolution optical imaging, precise optical focusing and manipulation in deep biological tissues. In addition, we also explored a series of potential applications, including information transmission, logical operation, encryption and decryption, optical nerve stimulation and micro-endoscope technology. Although challenges still exist, these exploratory studies are expected to make a major breakthrough in the near future, or will open up new horizons and development opportunities for the application of light in deep organizations and complex environments.