Evaluation on Micro-tomographic Visualization of Microcirculation Flow using Low Coherence Interferometer

Abstract

Rheological behavior of interstitial fluid in epidermal tissue, including blood micro-circulation, can vary skin mechanics in micro scale, i.e. visco-elasticity. Therefore, an in vivo diagnosis of blood velocity is quite necessary to diagnose skin tissue. In this paper, we propose OCDV (Optical Coherence Doppler Velocigraphy), which is a method of tomographic micro-visualizing blood flow velocity based on a high frequency modulated low coherence interferometer. The rapid scanning optical delay line was implemented as a reference arm so as to visualize video-rate tomography of velocity field. This system applied experimentally to RBCs suspension (Hct40%) pressurized into a simplified capillary vessel of rectangular PDMS microchannel. Consequently, this could offer tomographic velocity in micro circulation, as an in vivo tomographic diagnosing tool of blood flow velocity profiles in tissue.