Morphological characterization of cells in concentrated suspensions using multispectral diffuse optical tomography.

Based on a non-spherical model of particle scattering, we investigate the capabilities and limitations of a T-matrix based inverse algorithm to morphologically characterize cells in concentrated suspensions. Here the cells are modeled as randomly orientated spheroidal particles with homogenous dielectric properties and suspended in turbid media. The inverse algorithm retrieves the geometrical parameters and the concentration of cells simultaneously by inverting the reduced scattering coefficient spectra obtained from multispectral diffuse optical tomography (MS-DOT). Both round and spheroidal cells are tested and the role of multiple and higher order scattering of particles on the performance of the algorithm is evaluated using different concentrations of cells.