An endoscope system includes a light source that emits illumination light, an image sensor that captures an image of an object toward which the illumination light is emitted, and a processor. The processor is configured to determine whether a fluid is present in the object. If the fluid is not present in the object, the processor switches to a first observation mode in which to illuminate the object by first illumination light. If the fluid is present in the object, the processor switches to a second observation mode in which to illuminate the object by second illumination light. The second illumination light includes is larger than the first illumination light in a relative ratio of long wavelength components.

A medical image processing apparatus includes an image processor configured to: receive a plurality of first image data captured at different times and generated by illumination of light in a first wavelength band in sequence; receive a plurality of second image data captured at different times and generated by illumination of light in a second wavelength band different from the first wavelength band in sequence; generate first and second images based on the received first and second image data, respectively; and output the generated first image and second image to a display in chronological order of the first and second images and in accordance with a preset display pattern of the first and second images.

A medical imaging system is described that comprises an heating element configured to apply at least one heating pattern element to a material to locally heat the material; a sensor configured to capture the position of the heated material a predetermined time after the application of the heating pattern element; and circuitry configured to determine the change of the heating pattern applied to the material based upon the captured position of the heated material after the predetermined time.

Methods, endoscopic systems, and non-transitory, machine-readable storage media for adjusting an exposure of an endoscopic system are described. In an embodiment, the methods include emitting light with a light source into a proximal end of an endoscope light pipe; generating received light signals with a photodetector based on light received through the endoscope light pipe by the photodetector; displaying, with a display module, images based on the received light signals having a current image brightness; monitoring the received light signals for changes to the current image brightness; and adjusting a light source illuminance level, and in some embodiments a photodetector gain and exposure time, based on the current image brightness to maintain a target image brightness of the display module. In an embodiment, a brightness adjustment step size is less than a just-noticeable difference in brightness of an eye and is directly proportional to the current image brightness.

An image processing apparatus includes a processor including hardware. The processor is configured to: set a first acquisition condition and a second acquisition condition for a video processor configured to acquire a first image that is based on a display-purpose acquisition condition for acquiring an image for display at a frame rate for viewing and a second image that is based on an analysis-purpose acquisition condition for acquiring an image for image analysis at a frame rate that is lower than the frame rate for viewing, in a mixed manner, the first acquisition condition including the display-purpose acquisition condition, the second acquisition condition including the display-purpose acquisition condition and the analysis-purpose acquisition condition; generate support information based on an image analysis result; and control switching between the first acquisition condition and the second acquisition condition according to the image analysis result.

A novel in-vivo image capture device for capsule endoscope and its method of operation are described. The device includes a wafer level camera module design, high sensitivity backside illumination pixel with high definition image output and LED's to provide illumination, which is synchronized with an image sensor strobe signal. A frame rate of the device can be adjusted based on an angular motion detection from a gyroscope sensor, in which a high frame rate mode is maintained during fast motion while a low frame rate is maintained during slow or no motion. The image capture device also includes machine learning based SOC for image processing, enhancement, and compression. The SOC can process and store zone average of images. The image capture device also includes a high density flash storage to store images in the device, thus no RF transmitter is needed, which make the system more convenient to use.

Fluorescence imaging with reduced fixed pattern noise is disclosed. A method includes actuating an emitter to emit a plurality of pulses of electromagnetic radiation and sensing reflected electromagnetic radiation resulting from the plurality of pulses of electromagnetic radiation with a pixel array of an image sensor to generate a plurality of exposure frames. The method includes applying edge enhancement to edges within an exposure frame of the plurality of exposure frames. The method is such that at least a portion of the plurality of pulses of electromagnetic radiation emitted by the emitter comprises one or more of electromagnetic radiation having a wavelength from about 770 nm to about 790 nm.

A biological observation system includes: a light source apparatus configured to supply a first illuminating light, and a second illuminating light, while switching between the first illuminating light and the second illuminating light; an image pickup device configured to receive light from an object at each of a plurality of pixels having different sensitivities, and picks up an image; a color separation processing portion configured to separate, from respective color components, a color component obtained when an image of light of a predetermined wavelength band is picked up by a pixel having the greatest sensitivity to the light in the predetermined wavelength band; and a control portion configured to cause different processing to be performed between a case where an inputted image pickup signal corresponds to the first illuminating light and a case where an inputted image pickup signal corresponds to the second illuminating light.

A focus control device includes a processor including hardware, the processor being configured to implement: an area setting process that sets a plurality of areas, each including a plurality of pixels, on a captured image acquired by an imaging section, an evaluation value calculation process that calculates an AF (Autofocus) evaluation value for each of the plurality of set areas, a bright spot influence rate calculation process that calculates a bright spot influence rate for each of the plurality of set areas, based on whether or not the area includes a high luminance portion determined to have a size equal to or larger than a given size, and focus control based on the AF evaluation value and the bright spot influence rate.

Provided is a biological observation apparatus including: illuminating portions that irradiate biological tissue with illumination light including light in R, G, and B regions, respectively; an image acquisition portion that acquires image signals from reflected light of the illumination light coming from the biological tissue; narrow-band-light generating portions that are disposed in the illuminating portions or the image acquisition portion and that, in wavelength bands of the illumination light, generate two narrow-band beams for at least one of the R, G, and B wavelength bands constituting the illumination light, on either side of a central wavelength of that wavelength band; and an image-generating portion that generates an image on the basis of two or more types of the image signals obtained from the reflected light including two or more narrow bands acquired by the image acquisition portion.