Laser microbiopsy is a minimally invasive method to extract tissue samples

Biopsies are one of the most widely used diagnostic procedures for many types of diseases, including cancer. Today, the gold standard is to mechanically extract a tissue section, cut it into thin slices, and stain these with hematoxylin and eosin (H&E) to make the nuclei and cytoplasm of cells easier to see with a microscope. While this approach is well established in clinical practice, it has several disadvantages that call for the development of alternative procedures.