| Citation | David Delpy is distinguished for his introduction of new methods for the in-vivo measurement of tissue oxygenation and metabolism. His most outstanding contribution has been in the field of near infrared spectroscopy (NIRS). He devised novel "time of flight" methods for measuring optical pathlengths in tissue, and advance which enabled the non-invasive quantitation of a range of physiologically and clinically important variables, including cerebral blood flow and volume in ill newborn infants. These methods are now used world-wide. He has extended the NIRS measurement principle to the imaging of tissues, developing new measurement and image reconstruction techniques to visualise the distribution of blood oxygenation. He also pioneered the use of nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy for the study of cerebral metabolism, obtaining with colleagues the first spectral data from the human brain. The spectra have proved extremely informative for investigating the pathogenesis, prevention and treatment of brain injury. He earlier pioneered simultaneous and continuous transcutaneous blood O2 and CO2 analysis in infants, thereby much improving the management of respiratory illnesses. |