Dual-angle Mueller matrix polarimetry with digital filtering for single-cell analysis

Polarimetry plays an important role in single-cell analysis. However, single-cell analysis is susceptible to disturbances from impurity signals when analyzing scenarios with low sample concentration. In this paper, we develop a technique for suspended single-cell analysis by combining dual-angle Mueller matrix polarimetry with digital filtering. The system measures dual-angle Mueller matrix of suspended single cells with a rate of 25 kHz by rapid modulation of incident light polarization state and simultaneous monitoring of scattered light polarization state. Subsequently, a digital filtering model efficiently filtering impurity signals is obtained by back propagation network with input of dual-angle Mueller matrix. Phantom and cell experiments both demonstrate that the digital filtering model effectively filters out contaminating signals and significantly enhances analytical accuracy. Notably, the improvement in accuracy is particularly pronounced under low sample concentration conditions. This integrated approach provides a robust solution for accurate single-cell analysis in low sample concentration conditions.