Pulsed photothermal radiometric investigations of absorbing and scattering media

Pulsed photothermal radiometry (PPTR) is a contact free nondestructive method of material inspection. It also is a promising tool for in vivo tissue spectroscopy and on-line dosimetry. For this approach, one has to consider light scattering and thus a complicated signal interpretation. Different models of light propagation in scattering media are compared, such as Monte Carlo simulation (MCS) and various approaches of diffusion theory. Simulated PPTR signals with these calculations are compared. The validity of the different models in order to describe PPTR measurements correctly is discussed.© (1998) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.