Detection of colon cancer by terahertz techniques

Abstract

Normal and cancer affected samples of colon tissue have been measured using transmission time-domain terahertz spectroscopy and continuous wave terahertz imaging. We show that it is possible to distinguish between normal and cancerous regions in the samples when they are fixed in formalin or embedded in paraffin. Plots of the refractive index of normal and cancer affected tissues as well as 2-D transmission THz images are shown. Experimental results will be presented and the conditions for discrimination between normal and affected tissue will be discussed.