20 Medical Applications of NIR Spectroscopy
469
for screening in pharmacies, as life style management will create a corresponding
demand. Such portable NIR spectrometers could have an enormous potential in
the area of medical technology for performing routine diagnostic testing. Clinical
chemistry will certainly profit from less expensive miniaturized spectrometers that
hover just over the horizon.
Non-invasive monitoring technologies of blood glucose and blood ethanol are
candidates for another market, but there are also competing optical methods such
as Raman and MIR spectroscopy. Spectral histopathology is another area, but the
medical community is sometimes skeptical and quite slow in accepting novel developments. However, interdisciplinary collaboration will advance the introduction into
clinics. Another promising area is optical tomography for breast cancer screening
despite the image blurring owing to photon scattering in tissue. Functional NIR
spectroscopy seems to be unchallenged so far, but will need further standardization.
There is still a plethora of conventional or classical assays to be replaced by faster and
more accurate spectroscopic methodology. Furthermore, direct and fast diagnostics
and classification of diseases may be derived from the spectroscopic fingerprints of
biomedical samples.
Acknowledgements I am tremendously grateful for the collaboration and enormous support from
my collaborator Sven Delbeck over many years at the Interdisciplinary Center for Life Sciences
in Iserlohn during research and for teaching. Some earlier work was done at the Leibniz-Institute
for Analytical Sciences-ISAS, my former research institute in Dortmund. I am grateful for the
productive working atmosphere, which had been very much appreciated.
References
1. F.F. Jöbsis, Non-invasive infrared monitoring of cerebral and myocardial oxygen sufficiency
and circulatory parameters. Science 198, 1264–1267 (1977)
2. D.T. Delpy, M. Cope, Quantification in tissue near-infrared spectroscopy. Philos. Trans. R. Soc.
Lond. B. 352, 649–659 (1997). https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.1997.0046
3. B. Chance, E. Anday, S. Nioka, S. Zhou, L. Hong, K. Worden, C. Li, T. Murray, Y. Ovetsky, D.
Pidikiti, R. Thomas, A novel method for fast imaging of brain function, non-invasively, with
light. Opt. Express 2(10), 412–423 (1998)
4. J.E. Bertie, Z. Lan, Infrared intensities of liquids XX: The intensity of the OH stretching band
of liquid water revisited, and the best current values of the optical constants of H 2 O(l) at 25°C.
Appl. Spectrosc. 50, 1047–1057 (1996)
5. R.A. Shaw, H.H. Mantsch, Multianalyte serum assays from mid-IR spectra of dry films on
glass slides. Appl. Spectrosc. 54(6), 885–889 (2000)
6. A.K. Amerov, J. Chen, M.A. Arnold, Molar absorptivities of glucose and other biological
molecules in aqueous solutions over the first overtone and combination regions of the nearinfrared spectrum. Appl. Spectrosc. 58(10), 1195–1204 (2004)
7. R. Marbach, T. Koschinsky, F.A. Gries, H.M. Heise, Noninvasive blood glucose assay by nearinfrared diffuse reflectance spectroscopy of the human inner lip. Appl. Spectrosc. 47, 875–881
(1993)
8. H.M. Heise, R. Marbach, A. Bittner, T. Koschinsky, Clinical chemistry and near-infrared spectroscopy: multicomponent assay for human plasma and its evaluation for the determination of
blood substrates. J. Near. Infrared. Spectroscopy. 6, 361–374 (1998)
469
for screening in pharmacies, as life style management will create a corresponding
demand. Such portable NIR spectrometers could have an enormous potential in
the area of medical technology for performing routine diagnostic testing. Clinical
chemistry will certainly profit from less expensive miniaturized spectrometers that
hover just over the horizon.
Non-invasive monitoring technologies of blood glucose and blood ethanol are
candidates for another market, but there are also competing optical methods such
as Raman and MIR spectroscopy. Spectral histopathology is another area, but the
medical community is sometimes skeptical and quite slow in accepting novel developments. However, interdisciplinary collaboration will advance the introduction into
clinics. Another promising area is optical tomography for breast cancer screening
despite the image blurring owing to photon scattering in tissue. Functional NIR
spectroscopy seems to be unchallenged so far, but will need further standardization.
There is still a plethora of conventional or classical assays to be replaced by faster and
more accurate spectroscopic methodology. Furthermore, direct and fast diagnostics
and classification of diseases may be derived from the spectroscopic fingerprints of
biomedical samples.
Acknowledgements I am tremendously grateful for the collaboration and enormous support from
my collaborator Sven Delbeck over many years at the Interdisciplinary Center for Life Sciences
in Iserlohn during research and for teaching. Some earlier work was done at the Leibniz-Institute
for Analytical Sciences-ISAS, my former research institute in Dortmund. I am grateful for the
productive working atmosphere, which had been very much appreciated.
References
1. F.F. Jöbsis, Non-invasive infrared monitoring of cerebral and myocardial oxygen sufficiency
and circulatory parameters. Science 198, 1264–1267 (1977)
2. D.T. Delpy, M. Cope, Quantification in tissue near-infrared spectroscopy. Philos. Trans. R. Soc.
Lond. B. 352, 649–659 (1997). https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.1997.0046
3. B. Chance, E. Anday, S. Nioka, S. Zhou, L. Hong, K. Worden, C. Li, T. Murray, Y. Ovetsky, D.
Pidikiti, R. Thomas, A novel method for fast imaging of brain function, non-invasively, with
light. Opt. Express 2(10), 412–423 (1998)
4. J.E. Bertie, Z. Lan, Infrared intensities of liquids XX: The intensity of the OH stretching band
of liquid water revisited, and the best current values of the optical constants of H 2 O(l) at 25°C.
Appl. Spectrosc. 50, 1047–1057 (1996)
5. R.A. Shaw, H.H. Mantsch, Multianalyte serum assays from mid-IR spectra of dry films on
glass slides. Appl. Spectrosc. 54(6), 885–889 (2000)
6. A.K. Amerov, J. Chen, M.A. Arnold, Molar absorptivities of glucose and other biological
molecules in aqueous solutions over the first overtone and combination regions of the nearinfrared spectrum. Appl. Spectrosc. 58(10), 1195–1204 (2004)
7. R. Marbach, T. Koschinsky, F.A. Gries, H.M. Heise, Noninvasive blood glucose assay by nearinfrared diffuse reflectance spectroscopy of the human inner lip. Appl. Spectrosc. 47, 875–881
(1993)
8. H.M. Heise, R. Marbach, A. Bittner, T. Koschinsky, Clinical chemistry and near-infrared spectroscopy: multicomponent assay for human plasma and its evaluation for the determination of
blood substrates. J. Near. Infrared. Spectroscopy. 6, 361–374 (1998)