A laser scattering method for characterization of thromboemboli in whole blood

An optical scattering method, which measures the size, number, and type of microemboli located in flowing whole blood, is described. A perturbation solution to the one speed radiative transport equation is used to model the scattering geometry. The approximate two-parameter phase function is used to investigate scattering characteristics of microemboli. The nature of microemboli is determined by comparing the scattered intensity ratio in two forward directions, while the size and number are determined by considering intensities scattered perpendicularly to the incident direction. This method has been tested with several sizes of polystyrene spheres, air bubbles, and blood dots. The results showed excellent agreement with calculations.