Characterizing colon cancer stages through optical polarimetry-assisted digital staining.

Tissue polarimetry has been gaining importance in extracting useful diagnostic information from the structural attributes of tissues, which vary in response to the tissue health status and hence find great potential in cancer diagnosis. However, the complexities associated with cancer make it challenging to isolate the characteristic changes as the tumor progresses using polarimetry. This study attempts to experimentally characterize the polarimetric behavior in colon cancer associated with various stages of development. Bulk and unstained sections of normal and tumor colon tissue were imaged in the reflection and transmission polarimetry configurations at low and high imaging resolutions using an in-house developed Mueller polarimeter. Through this study, we observed that the information about the major contributors of scattering in colon tissue, manifesting in depolarization and retardance, can be obtained from the bulk tissue and unstained sections. These parameters aid in characterizing the polarimetric changes as the colon tumor progresses. While the unstained colon section best indicated the depolarization contrast between normal and tumor, the contrast through the retardance parameter was more pronounced in the bulk colon tissue. The results suggest that the polarimetric "digitally stained" images obtained by Mueller polarimetry are comparable with the bulk tissue counterparts, making it useful for characterizing colon cancer tissues across different stages of development.

Skin microcirculatory responses: A potential marker for early diabetic neuropathy assessment using a low-cost portable diffuse optical spectrometry device.

Diffuse optical measurement is an evolving optical modality providing a fast and portable solution for microcirculation assessment. Diffuse optics in static and dynamic modalities are combined here in a system to assess hemodynamics in skin tissues of control and diabetic subjects. The in-house developed system consists of a laser source, fiber optic probe, a low-cost avalanche photodiode, a finite element model (FEM) derived static optical property estimator, and a software correlator for continuous flow monitoring through microvasculature. The studies demonstrated that the system quantifies the changes in blood flow rate in the immediate skin subsurface. The system is calibrated with in vitro flow models and a proof-of-concept was demonstrated on a limited number of subjects in a clinical environment. The flow changes in response to vasoconstrictive and vasodilative stimuli were analyzed and used to classify different stages of diabetes, including diabetic neuropathy.

Glucose sensing in oral mucosa simulating phantom using differential absorption based frequency domain low-coherence interferometry.

The superluminescent diode based differential absorption frequency domain low-coherence interferometry (FD-DALCI) technique is proposed and demonstrated for sensing physiological concentrations of glucose (0-250 mg/dl) in oral mucosa simulating phantoms (intralipid of concentrations 0.25-0.50%) with wavelengths at 1589 and 1310 nm. The proposed technique allows simultaneous measurements of refractive index based spectral shift and estimation of physiological concentration of glucose in intralipid with scattering characteristics using the differential absorption approach. The sensitivity of the glucose concentration obtained by spectral shift measurement was ≈0.016 nm/(mg/dl), irrespective of the intralipid concentration. The resolution of the glucose level was estimated to be ≈15 mg/dl in 0.25% intralipid and ≈19 mg/dl in 0.5% intralipid using the FD-DALCI technique.

Quantitative assessment of soft tissue deformation using digital speckle pattern interferometry: studies on phantom breast models.

Assessment of mechanical properties of soft matter is a challenging task in a purely noninvasive and noncontact environment. As tissue mechanical properties play a vital role in determining tissue health status, such noninvasive methods offer great potential in framing large-scale medical screening strategies. The digital speckle pattern interferometry (DSPI)-based image capture and analysis system described here is capable of extracting the deformation information from a single acquired fringe pattern. Such a method of analysis would be required in the case of the highly dynamic nature of speckle patterns derived from soft tissues while applying mechanical compression. Soft phantoms mimicking breast tissue optical and mechanical properties were fabricated and tested in the DSPI out of plane configuration set up. Hilbert transform (HT)-based image analysis algorithm was developed to extract the phase and corresponding deformation of the sample from a single acquired fringe pattern. The experimental fringe contours were found to correlate with numerically simulated deformation patterns of the sample using Abaqus finite element analysis software. The extracted deformation from the experimental fringe pattern using the HT-based algorithm is compared with the deformation value obtained using numerical simulation under similar conditions of loading and the results are found to correlate with an average %error of 10. The proposed method is applied on breast phantoms fabricated with included subsurface anomaly mimicking cancerous tissue and the results are analyzed.

Concentration-dependent correlated scattering properties of Intralipid 20% dilutions.

Dilutions of Intralipid 20% are widely used as optical phantoms for mimicking scattering properties of turbid media such as tissues. One of the frequently used methodologies for quantifying the scattering coefficient and anisotropy of Intralipid 20% is the use of single-particle Mie scattering theory, which in fact is not valid for nontenuous media. Hence, two methodologies consisting of analytical wave theory and effective medium theory, incorporating particle size distribution and concentration-dependent correlated scattering phenomena, are used to estimate the effective scattering coefficient and anisotropy of Intralipid 20% dilutions (1%-100% v/v) from 380 to 1000 nm.

Correlation analysis of laser Doppler flowmetry signals: a potential non-invasive tool to assess microcirculatory changes in diabetes mellitus.

Measurement and analysis of microcirculation is vital in assessing local and systemic tissue health. Changes in microvascular perfusion if detected can provide information on the development of various related diseases. Laser Doppler blood flowmetry (LDF) provides a non-invasive real-time measurement of cutaneous blood perfusion. LDF signals possess fractal nature that represents the correlation in the successive signal elements. Changes in the correlation of flow and its associated parameters could be used as a tool in differentiating the ailments at different stages or assessing the treatment effectiveness of a particular ailment. Spectral domain analysis of LDF signals reveals five characteristic frequency peaks corresponding to local and central regulatory mechanisms of the human body, namely metabolic, neurogenic, myogenic, respiration, and heart rate. This paper investigates the changes in the fractal nature and constituent frequency bands of laser Doppler signals in diabetic and healthy control subjects acquired from the glabrous skin of the foot so as to provide an assessment of microcirculatory dynamics. As a pilot study, it was attempted on a set of healthy control and diabetic volunteers, and the obtained results indicate that fractal nature of LDF signals is less in diabetic subjects compared to the healthy control. The wavelet analysis carried out on the set of signals reveals the dynamics of blood flow which may have led to the difference in correlation results.