Using elastic light scattering of red blood cells to detect infection of malaria parasite

To develop noninvasive diagnosis of malaria, we studied the light-scattering pattern of healthy and 2% Plasmodium falciparum malaria parasitized red blood cells. By measuring the wavelength-dependent scattering at discrete angles of both forward and backward directions, we found that the signal can clearly distinguish between healthy and ring stage infected red blood cells. In particular, we demonstrated the first backward scattering measurement, which enables elastic light scattering as a promising noninvasive diagnostic tool for malaria.