Abstract
Laser Raman spectroscopy, which is a powerful nondestructive structural probe for biological molecules and objects, has been recently applied to medical problems. Rapid progress in multichannel detector gives considerable promise to laser Raman spectroscopy as a diagnostic or analitical tool in medicine.
We present here two examples of medical application of multichannel laser Raman spectroscopy. One is cataract diagnosis by Raman spectroscopy, and the other is nondestructive analysis of gallstones by the same technique.
With regard to the cataract diagnosis, we recently succeeded in obtaining Raman spectrum of an excised lens with only 1 mW and 1 second of laser irradiation (488.0nm). This success strongly suggests that one can detect the Raman signal directly from a human eye lens without any damage to the eye.
Concerning the second application we so far examined about 10 gallstones by the use of the Raman microprobe, and it turned out that the combined Raman microprobe-FT-IR microscope method is very powerful for studying the microstructure of various gallstones.
