Supercontinuum-based nondisruptive scattering analyses of mouse fibroblast L929 cells before and after necrosis

The scattering properties of biological tissue are highly dependent on the structure size, refractive index, and wavelength of the incident light. Furthermore, these scattering characteristics are strongly influenced by movements of the scattering objects. A method is developed to determine the angular- and spectral-resolved scattering properties that enabled the characterization of biological nano- and microscaled cell structures. Nanosecond pulses from a spectrally filtered supercontinuum light source are captured and time-resolved to depress background noise and minimize disruptive effects of the biological cells. The scattering characteristics of a monolayer of mouse fibroblast L929 cells are measured at defined wavelengths in a standard cell culture plate. Because of the size and distribution of the scattering structures, a Fourier transform-based Mie scattering scheme is used to analyze the data. The system is tested to detect structural changes of mouse fibroblast L929 cells before and after poisoning with Triton X100. The final result is the development of a contamination-free method to study pathological changes in cell cultures, necrosis, or other cell-damaging effects.