Saturated signals in spectroscopic imaging: why and how should we deal with this regularly observed phenomenon?

We have all been confronted one day by saturated signals observed on acquired spectra, whatever the technique considered. A saturation, also known as clipping in signal processing, is a form of distortion that limits a signal once it exceeds a threshold. As a consequence, clipped or saturated bands with their characteristic plateau present numerical values that do not correspond to the analytical reality of the analyzed sample. Of course, analysts know that they cannot consider these erroneous values and therefore reconsider either sample preparation or instrument settings. Unfortunately, there are many experiments today (and this is the case in spectroscopic imaging) for which we will not be able to fight against the saturation effect that will undeniably be observed on the acquired spectra. The aim of this article is first to show why it is important to correct these saturation effects at the risk of having a biased view of the sample and more specifically in the context of multivariate data analysis. In a second step, we will look at strategies for managing saturated bands. An original concept will then be presented by considering saturated values as missing ones. A statistical imputation strategy will then be implemented in order to recover the information lost during the measurement.