TY - JOUR
T1 - Monte Carlo simulations shed light on Bathsheba's suspect breast
AU - Heijblom, Michelle
AU - Meijer, Linda M.
AU - van Leeuwen, Ton G.
AU - Steenbergen, Wiendelt
AU - Manohar, Srirang
PY - 2014
Y1 - 2014
N2 - In 1654, Rembrandt van Rijn painted his famous painting Bathsheba at her Bath. Over the years, the depiction of Bathsheba's left breast and especially the presence of local discoloration, has generated debate on whether Rembrandt's Bathsheba suffered from breast cancer. Historical, medical and artistic arguments appeared to be not sufficient to prove if Bathsheba's model truly suffered from breast cancer. However, the bluish discoloration of the breast is an intriguing aspect from a biomedical optics point of view that might help us ending the old debate. By using Monte Carlo simulations in combination with the retinex theory of color vision, we showed that is highly unlikely that breast cancer results in a local bluish discoloration of the skin as is present on Bathsheba's breast
AB - In 1654, Rembrandt van Rijn painted his famous painting Bathsheba at her Bath. Over the years, the depiction of Bathsheba's left breast and especially the presence of local discoloration, has generated debate on whether Rembrandt's Bathsheba suffered from breast cancer. Historical, medical and artistic arguments appeared to be not sufficient to prove if Bathsheba's model truly suffered from breast cancer. However, the bluish discoloration of the breast is an intriguing aspect from a biomedical optics point of view that might help us ending the old debate. By using Monte Carlo simulations in combination with the retinex theory of color vision, we showed that is highly unlikely that breast cancer results in a local bluish discoloration of the skin as is present on Bathsheba's breast
U2 - https://doi.org/10.1002/jbio.201200147
DO - https://doi.org/10.1002/jbio.201200147
M3 - Article
C2 - 23225631
SN - 1864-063X
VL - 7
SP - 323
EP - 331
JO - Journal of Biophotonics
JF - Journal of Biophotonics
IS - 5
ER -