FT-IR microscopy imaging on oral cavity tumours, II

Changes in the biochemistry of oral cavity tissues have been studied by FT-IR microscopy. Various aspects of squamous cell carcinomas of cheek mucosa, of tongue, of gingiva, and of the floor of the mouth have been analyzed through FT-IR imaging with the aim to relate spectral patterns with histopathological results. In particular, changes in frequency and intensity of proteins, connective and nucleic acids vibrational modes as well as the visualization of biochemical single wavenumber or band ratio images allowed a quali- and quantitative evaluation of the changes in the proliferating activity from displastic to neoplastic states. 'Supervised' and 'unsupervised' procedures of data handling afforded a satisfactory degree of accordance between spectroscopic and histological findings.