Can temporal analysis of optical coherence tomography statistics report on dextrorotatory-glucose levels in blood?

We report the use of optical coherence tomography (OCT) for measuring dextrorotatory-glucose (D-glucose) in liquid phantoms and in drawn blood based on temporal dynamics of light scattering. The presence of D-glucose alters the medium viscosity, thus affecting the Brownian motion of the scatterers (polystyrene microspheres (PMS) in phantoms, red blood cells (RBCs) in blood) as measured by OCT. To quantify the effect, the signal autocorrelation functions were measured from M-mode OCT data and exponentially fit to obtain the decorrelation times. These were then related to translational (and rotational, in case of asymmetric scatterers) diffusion coefficients which enabled the determination of D-glucose-controlled medium viscosity. Obtained viscosily values agreed well with the literature, and showed expected increase with D-glucose concentrations. Whole blood smears were imaged with microscope and another effect of added glucose, that of red blood cell deformation, was also observed. This phantom and blood OCT study demonstrates the technique’s ability to detect and quantify D-glucose presence in non-flowing liquid suspensions, and suggests several additional research routes necessary to determine its potential for in vivo applications.