A comparative study of analytical models of diffuse reflectance in homogeneous biological tissues: Gelatin based phantoms and Monte Carlo experiments

Information about tissue oxygen saturation (StO ₂) and other related important physiological parameters can be extracted from diffuse reflectance spectra measured through non-contact imaging. Three analytical optical reflectance models for homogeneous, semi-infinite, tissue have been proposed (Modified Beer–Lambert, Jacques 1999, Yudovsky 2009) but these have not been directly compared for tissue parameter extraction purposes. We compare these analytical models using Monte Carlo (MC) simulated diffuse reflectance spectra and controlled gelatin-based phantoms with measured diffuse reflectance spectra and known ground truth composition parameters. The Yudovsky model performed best against MC simulations and measured spectra of tissue phantoms in terms of goodness of fit and parameter extraction accuracy followed closely by Jacques' model. In this study, Yudovsky's model appeared most robust; however, our results demonstrated that both Yudovsky and Jacques models are suitable for modeling tissue that can be approximated as a single, homogeneous, semi-infinite slab.