Abstract: It is important to detect disease early because this increases the probability of
effective treatment. Elasticity measurements can help identify diseased tissue. Full
Field Optical Coherence Microscopy (FFOCM) is a sensitive, high resolution, non-contact and non-invasive optical imaging modality that allows for depth sectioning
in highly scattering media such as biological tissue. As a result, tissue elasticity
can be determined as a function of depth. This thesis sets out to establish the fact
that differences in tissue elasticity can be discerned with FFOCM. A home-made
FFOCM system was built, characterized, and tested. Tissue phantoms were used
along with plant cells. We show that FFOCM shows great potential in determining
tissue elasticity.
