Use of a fast CCD camera for imaging through turbid media”

In this paper we present a system for optical imaging in turbid media based on an intensified CCD camera. The time-gating capability of the light intensifier has been used to acquire time sliced images of the light transmitted through phantoms made of intralipid and ink solutions. Then, we analyzed the images by fitting the time series with a theoretical expression for photon migration. This allowed us to recover the maps of the absorption (mu (a)) and scattering (mu (s)') coefficients in an extended area of the samples. Using our system a possible heterogeneity in the sample can be easily detected. We characterized the performances of the system following two approaches. First, we evaluated the linearity of the relationship between the recovered absorption coefficient and the ink concentration and between the recovered scattering coefficient and the intralipid content (homogeneous samples). Then, we measured the apparent contrast in the mu (s)' maps resulting from small inclusions with a scattering coefficient higher and lower with respect to a homogeneous background (heterogeneous samples). Results encourage further researches.