Spectroscopic Optical Coherence Tomography and Microscopy

Imaging biological tissues using optical coherence tomography is enhanced with spectroscopic analysis, providing new metrics for functional imaging. Recent advances in spectroscopic optical coherence tomography (SOCT) include techniques for the discrimination of endogenous tissue types and for the detection of exogenous contrast agents. In this paper, we review these techniques and their associated signal processing algorithms, while highlighting their potential for biomedical applications. We unify the theoretical framework for time- and frequency-domain SOCT and introduce a noise correction method. Differences between spectroscopic Mie scatterers are demonstrated with SOCT, and spectroscopic imaging of macrophage and fibroblast cells in a 3-D scaffold is shown.