Optical diagnosis of laryngeal cancer using high wavenumber Raman spectroscopy

We report the implementation of the transnasal image-guided high wavenumber (HW) Raman spectroscopy to differentiate tumor from normal laryngeal tissue at endoscopy. A rapid-acquisition Raman spectroscopy system coupled with a miniaturized fiber-optic Raman probe was utilized to realize real-time HW Raman (2800–3020 cm−1) measurements in the larynx. A total of 94 HW Raman spectra (22 normal sites, 72 tumor sites) were acquired from 39 patients who underwent laryngoscopic screening. Significant differences in Raman intensities of prominent Raman bands at 2845, 2880 and 2920 cm−1 (CH2 stretching of lipids), and 2940 cm−1 (CH3 stretching of proteins) were observed between normal and cancer laryngeal tissue. The diagnostic algorithms based on principal components analysis (PCA) and linear discriminant analysis (LDA) together with the leave-one subject-out, cross-validation method on HW Raman spectra yielded a diagnostic sensitivity of 90.3% (65/72) and specificity of 90.9% (20/22) for laryngeal cancer identification. This study demonstrates that HW Raman spectroscopy has the potential for the noninvasive, real-time diagnosis and detection of laryngeal cancer at the molecular level.

► We demonstrate the feasibility of transnasal image-guided HW Raman endoscopic spectroscopy for laryngeal cancer diagnosis at endoscopy.
► We observe the significant differences in HW Raman spectra between normal and cancer laryngeal tissue.
► PCA–LDA modeling on HW Raman spectra provides good laryngeal tissue diagnosis and characterization.