Method to quantitate absorption coefficients from single fiber reflectance spectra without knowledge of the scattering properties

This study presents a methodology to accurately extract the absorption coefficient from single fiber reflectance spectra measured in turbid media without a priori knowledge of either the reduced scattering coefficient or the phase function. This novel approach accounts for the interrelated effects these properties have on the photon path length, yielding estimates of an absorption coefficient on average within <7.5% of true values over a wide range of biologically relevant optical properties. (C) 2011 Optical Society of America