Comparison of hepatocellular carcinoma and healthy liver tissues utilizing the optical polarized system

Abstract

Liver cancer is currently ranked to be the sixth most common cancer worldwide. Indeed, hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the most frequent type of liver cancer. In this study, we applied an optical polarization system utilizing the Stokes-Mueller matrix to differentiate the HCC tissues with normal ones based on optical characteristics decomposed from the interaction of cancerous and normal tissues with polarized light. Nine optical parameters from tissues were extracted, specifically LB orientation angle (α), the LB phase retardance (β), the CB optical rotation angle (γ), the LD orientation angle (θd), the linear dichroism (D), the circular dichroism (R), the degrees of linear depolarization (e1 and e2), the degree of circular depolarization (e3), and the depolarization index (Δ). The experimental results showed that the orientation angle of linear birefringence (α), linear dichroism (D), and orientation angle of linear dichroism (θd) have the differences between cancerous and normal tissues. It promises a practical penetration to the optical characteristic of liver cancer based on Stokes-Mueller matrix polarimetry.