Patent ID: 7567347
Filing Date: 2009-07-28
Classification: G01J,G01N

Abstract:
1. Apparatus to be worn on the body for the production and detection of fluorescence at or below a skin surface, said apparatus comprising: a light source for directing fluorescence excitation light along a light path extending over said skin surface; a reflector having a three dimensionally curved, shell-like light reflecting interface positioned to receive light from the light source passing over said skin surface along a portion of said light path and to reflect said light transversely with respect to said portion of the light path so as to focus said light on an illumination zone at or below said skin surface for stimulation of fluorescence at said zone, and to collect fluorescence light emitted at said zone and to reflect and at least partially collimate said light to pass back along said portion of the light path; a detector for receiving said light emitted as fluorescence after reflection at said interface, and a housing containing the light source, detector and reflector, which housing is configured to be worn on the body, wherein said reflector interface substantially has the form of a partial paraboloid, aspheric, toroidal, or biconic surface, and wherein said reflector interface is defined by an equation wherein: c is from 0.07 to 0.5 and k is from −1.5 to −0.7. where z is the “sag” of z-coordinate along the rotational axis, c is the curvature (the reciprocal of the radius R), k is the conical constant and r is the radial coordinate.