Purpose of the research is to identify optical predictors and biomarkers of health and disease.
Hypothesis: microstructural, metabolic, vascular, protein, genomic and metabolomics biomarkers of oral pathology can be used to detect, predict and map oral pathology, especially neoplasia.
Researchers of the Beckman Laser Institute (BLI) have developed many non-invasive imaging modalities for assessment of oral tissue. This protocol will allow data acquisition with these multiple modalities to allow validation of data. Imaging modalities to be utilized include:
1. Coherence and Doppler Tomography (OCT)
2. Laser Speckle Imaging (LSI)
3. Photon Migration Spectroscopy (PMS)
4. Autofluorescence Imaging
In addition, saliva samples from the patients will be analyzed and the resulting data regarding the dysregulation in the activities of genes, proteins and other molecules will be correlated with findings from different imaging systems with respect to the stage of oral carcinogenesis.
