Abstract
Along with rapid development of diagnostic and therapeutic applications of lasers in medicine, optical properties of various biological tissues have been extensively studied [1]. Most of the studies were performed in vitro owing to the complexity involved in in vivo measurement. To date, it is well understood that living tissue is an absorbing and scattering heterogeneous medium because of its complex structures including blood network. The transport theory cannot be readily used due to the heterogeneity and the absence of the optical properties of living tissues [2]. In this research, we have developed a procedure for measuring the total attenuation coefficient (μ1) of the exteriorized rat 2-D spinotrapezius muscle in the wavelength ranged from 480–560 nm using the collimated light from a Nitrogen-pumped dye laser and a high-sensitivity CCD camera.
