When noise became information: State-of-the-art in biospeckle laser

ABSTRACT Laser was presented to science and industry in the 1960s and shortly became a useful tool in many areas, with applications based on its multiple characteristics such as coherence of light, which presents a phenomenon known as interference pattern, or speckle, when beam returns from an illuminated surface. Despite great application of speckle pattern, its residual presence, for example, in interferometric approaches was considered as a noise, demanding filtering. However, grains themselves became information as their dynamic changes in time started to be linked to biological sample activity. Dynamic laser speckle has been since then a phenomenon widely used to monitor biological activities in many areas from agriculture to medicine. It is known as biospeckle laser (BSL) when adopted in biological material, with high sensitivity to follow very tiny movements in biological tissues, linked to changes in speckle provided by scatterer activities inside and outside cells. Since the 1970s, biospeckle laser usage follows a crescent technologic spiral where technological developments opened room for new applications, while new demands regarding biological monitoring forced the development of new methodologies. Therefore, potential adoption of the phenomenon as a sensor, for instance, in agricultural and medical processes, as well as constant offer of new devices provided new turns in the BSL technologic spiral and opened room for technique improvement. In this study, I present a short history of biospeckle laser (BSL) with applications and development associated with challenges regarding its usage in portable and accessible devices or even in commercial equipment. And the history was packed in a temporal diagram identifying the breakpoints responsible for improvements in the use of the technique. RESUMO O laser foi apresentado à ciência e à indústria em 1960, e rapidamente tornou-se uma ferramenta útil à muitas áreas do conhecimento, que fazem uso de suas múltiplas características, como é o caso da coerência da luz, que é responsável pelo fenômeno conhecido como padrão de interferência, ou speckle; este padrão de interferência ocorre quando a luz retorna do material iluminado formando uma figura de interferência para o observador. Apesar da grande aplicação, a presença residual do padrão de speckle em abordagens interferométricas apresentava-se como um ruído que demanda filtragem. Apesar da dificuldade em alguns casos, os grãos de speckle tornaram-se fonte