Noninvasive Raman tomographic imaging of canine bone tissue.

Raman spectroscopic diffuse tomographic imaging has been demonstrated for the first time. It provides a noninvasive, label-free modality to image the chemical composition of human and animal tissue and other turbid media. This technique has been applied to image the composition of bone tissue within an intact section of a canine limb. Spatially distributed 785-nm laser excitation was employed to prevent thermal damage to the tissue. Diffuse emission tomography reconstruction was used, and the location that was recovered has been confirmed by micro-computed tomography (micro-CT) images.