CLINICAL DETERMINATION OF TISSUE OPTICAL-PROPERTIES BY ENDOSCOPIC SPATIALLY-RESOLVED REFLECTOMETRY

A noninvasive method to measure the optical properties of a diffusing and absorbing medium is described. Based on the spatially resolved mea surement of diffuse reflectance at the sample surface, this method is particularly suitable for investigating the in vivo optical properties of biological tissues endoscopically in a clinical context. The sensi tivity of the measurement is discussed, and two optical probes for two different clinical applications are presented. Preliminary measuremen ts are performed on a nonbiological medium, which illustrate the possi bilities of the proposed method. Finally, we report on in vivo measure ments of the optical properties of the human esophageal wall at 630 nm . (C) 1996 Optical Society of America