Abstract

The success of biomedical optical imaging with time-dependent measurements of photon migration depend upon (i) measuring changes in photon migration due to differences in the optical properties of normal and diseased tissues, and (ii) employing these measurements in a robust algorithm to solve the inverse imaging problem. However, the differences in optical properties of normal and diseased tissues are as yet, not known and the differences required for optical contrast remain to be identified. Without optical contrast, the solution to inverse imaging problem will remain academic. In this paper, we present optical property measurements of freshly excised normal and diseased breast tissues to study the potential for photon migration imaging as a tool for breast cancer screening. Measurements of absorption, scattering and anisotropy obtained from double integrating sphere measurements at 633 run and at 37°C are presented. In addition, finite element predictions of time-dependent photon migration measurements are presented to show the difficulties in employing endogenous optical property differences for detecting the presence of diseased tissues. Exogenous changes in scattering, absorption, fluorescence are investigated using the finite element technique as potential mode for the most efficient optical imaging contrast agent for photon migration imaging.

© 1994 Optical Society of America