Quantitative Fluorescence Spectroscopy of Turbid Samples

Recent advances in electro-optic technology have led to considerable study of fluorescence spectroscopy as a non-invasive method for tissue diagnosis. Investigations fall into two basic categories: (1) development of diagnostic algorithms based on differences in spectra that can be correlated to histopathology, (2) quantitative tissue biochemistry. This dissertation concentrates on the latter, with emphasis on development of modeling techniques (two-flux Kubelka -Munk theory, Rank Annihilation Factor Analysis, the Method of Partial Least Squares) for extracting fluorophore concentrations from turbid samples and hardware to rapidly and remotely acquire fluorescence spectra over a wide range of excitation and emission wavelengths in vivo.