Patent ID: 8326404

Claim:
A method for characterizing a tissue, the method comprising: obtaining features of a Raman spectrum of the tissue in a first wavelength range; obtaining features of a background fluorescence spectrum of the tissue in a second wavelength range overlapping with the first wavelength range, wherein the background fluorescence spectrum is a background to the Raman spectrum in the first wavelength range; and, characterizing the tissue based upon at least the Raman spectrum features and the background fluorescence spectrum features wherein the tissue is tissue of a subject and the method comprises: obtaining features of a Raman spectrum and a background fluorescence spectrum of a control area of normal tissue of the subject; wherein characterizing the tissue is based in part upon a difference between one or more features of the Raman spectrum of the tissue and the Raman spectrum of the control area and based in part on a difference between the background fluorescence spectrum of the tissue and the background fluorescence spectrum of the control area.