IPASC Mission
The overall goal of IPASC is to reach consensus on photoacoustic imaging (PAI) standardization to improve the quality of preclinical studies and to accelerate efforts in clinical translation. Furthermore, by establishing standards IPASC hopes to facilitate open access, use, and exchange of data between different groups.
IPASC is currently represented globally in over 15 countries with more than 140 academic and industrial members (see our Member List for a full overview). If you also want to get involved and contribute to the consortium, please follow the ‘Get Involved’ instructions. To learn more about the goals and efforts of IPASC, please also have a look at our letter to the editor published in Nature Photonics.
IPASC aims to:
- Define widely accepted phantoms for use with preclinical and clinical PAI systems
- Provide open, publicly available, reference datasets for testing of data reconstruction and spectral processing algorithms in a widely accepted data format
- Use these phantoms to enable quantitative comparison of PAI data acquired with different system designs and analysed with different data reconstruction and spectral processing algorithms
- Agree upon a standardized and validated test method for new PAI instruments to help with comparison of published results.
IPASC thematic areas:
To achieve these goals, the IPASC efforts have been streamlined into four thematic areas:
- Clinical Adoption
- Test Objects and Methods
- Standards Development
- Data Management
IPASC Industry Board:
The Industry Board represents the industry’s specific interests in the context of standardization and consists of vendors of photoacoustic imaging equipment or components, united under the umbrella of IPASC.

IPASC Roadmapping Event , June 10th 2022 discussing the future of photoacoustic imaging