We report on the development of a compact commercial instrument for measuring carotenoids in skin tissue. The instrument uses two light emitting diodes (LEDs) for dual-wavelength excitation and four photomultiplier tubes for multichannel detection. Bandpass filters are used to select the excitation and detection wavelengths. The f/1.3 optical system has high optical throughput and single photon sensitivity, both of which are crucial in LED-based Raman measurements. We employ a signal processing technique that compensates for detector drift and error. The sensitivity and reproducibility of the LED Raman instrument compares favorably to laser-based Raman spectrometers. This compact, portable instrument is used for non-invasive measurement of carotenoid molecules in human skin with a repeatability better than 10%.
@article{arxiv.0801.1697,
title = {Resonance Raman measurements of carotenoids using light emitting diodes},
author = {S. D. Bergeson and J. B. Peatross and N. J. Eyring and J. F. Fralick and D. N. Stevenson and S. B. Ferguson},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0801.1697},
year = {2009}
}
Comments
Accepted for publication by the Journal of Biomedical Optics