Real-time Raman spectroscopy for non-invasive skin cancer detection - preliminary results

Raman spectroscopy is a non-invasive optical technique, which can assess molecular structures and conformations within biological tissue. The probability of Raman scattering is inherently low such that previous clinical applications of Raman spectroscopy have been limited by long data acquisition times. We have developed a rapid real-time Raman spectrometer system with measurement times of less than 1 second, paving the way for clinical application. In this presentation, we report preliminary clinical results for this real-time Raman system. To date 289 skin cancers and benign skin lesions have been measured. Using partial least squares regression and linear discriminant analysis to analyze the Raman spectra we found that skin cancers could be well differentiated from benign skin lesions (sensitivity 91% and specificity 75%) and malignant melanoma from benign pigmented lesions (sensitivity 97%, specificity 78%).