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Photon transport through the entire adult human head

2024/12/02 by Jack Radford, Radford, Jack, Vytautas Gradauskas +9 · 5 voices
Medicine · #Radiation Dose and Imaging

paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2412.01360

Abstract

Optical brain imaging technologies are promising due to their relatively high temporal resolution, portability and cost-effectiveness. However, the highly scattering nature of near-infrared light in human tissue makes it challenging to collect photons emerging from more than 4 cm below the scalp, or with source-detector separation larger than several centimeters. We explore the physical limits of photon transport in the head and show that despite an extreme attenuation of ~10^(18), we can experimentally detect light that is transmitted diametrically through the entire adult human head. Analysis of various photon migration pathways through the head also indicates how the source-detector configuration can be used to isolate photons interacting with deep regions of the brain that are inaccessible with current optical techniques.

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