Development of silicone-based phantoms for biomedical optics from 400 to 1550 nm

This work describes the development of silicone-based evaluation phantoms for biomedical optics in the wavelength range from 400 to 1550 nm. The absorption coefficient <i>μ</i> _a and the reduced scattering coefficient <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:msubsup><mml:mi>μ</mml:mi> <mml:mtext>s</mml:mtext> <mml:mrow><mml:mi>'</mml:mi></mml:mrow> </mml:msubsup> </mml:math> were determined using an integrating sphere setup. Zirconium dioxide pigments were used as scatterers and carbon black as absorbers. We developed an in-house manufacturing process using a Hauschild SpeedMixer to ensure reproducibility. A set of nine cubic phantoms with three different reduced scattering and absorption coefficients was produced. Prediction of the <i>μ</i> _a and <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"><mml:msubsup><mml:mi>μ</mml:mi> <mml:mtext>s</mml:mtext> <mml:mrow><mml:mi>'</mml:mi></mml:mrow> </mml:msubsup> </mml:math> was done by using the weighted mass concentrations of the used materials. The average prediction accuracy over all wavelengths and phantoms is 1.0% for the reduced scattering coefficient and 3.5% for the absorption coefficient.