A new optical coefficient of biological tissue that determines the diffuse reflectance light distribution on the tissue surface

When a light beam is incident normally upon a tissue, the spatial distribution of diffuse reflectance on the tissue surface is affected by the optical properties of the tissue. The purpose of this paper is to find the relationship between the spatial distribution of diffuse reflectance on the tissue surface and optical properties of the tissue. The diffuse reflected light distribution is found to be determined mainly by a new optical coefficient μas. A qualitative relationship between μas and the diffuse reflected light distribution was developed by Monte Carlo simulations. Measurements of the diffuse reflected light distribution on solutions of Intralipid-10% with added ink confirm the Monte Carlo simulations. The new optical coefficient μas was measured from several tissue examples by the qualitative relationship. The value of μas was useful for determining the components of the tissue.