Identification of tumor tissue by FTIR spectroscopy in combination with positron emission tomography

A method is described for identifying tumor tissue by means of FTIR microspectroscopy and positron emission tomography (PET). Thin tissue sections of human squamous carcinoma from hypopharynx (FaDu) and human colon adenocarcinoma (HT-29) grown in nude mice were investigated. FTIR spectroscopic maps of the thin tissue sections were generated and evaluated by Fuzzy C-Means (FCM) clustering and principal component analysis (PCA). The processed data were reassembled into images and compared to stained tissue samples and to PET. Tumor tissue could successfully be identified by this FTIR microspectroscopic method, while it was not possible to accomplish this with PET alone. On the other hand, PET permitted the non-invasive screening for suspicious tissue inside the body, which could not be achieved by FTIR.