In vivo scattering measurement of biological tissue by the use of a pyroelectric polymer transducer.

We propose a new method, to our knowledge, for noninvasive scattering measurements of tissues by the use of a pyroelectric polymer transducer, poly(vinylidene fluoride trifluoroethylene) film. In this method, samples are irradiated with nanosecond, low-energy light pulses delivered from an optical fiber, and the pyroelectric signal induced by the diffuse reflectance is measured with a transducer. The signal is then converted into diffuse reflectance by use of a calibration factor. The validity of this method was confirmed by our measuring the scattering coefficient of a white acrylic resin within an accuracy of +/- 15%. We attempted to apply this method to the estimation of scattering coefficients of normal and burned skins in rats in vivo.