Illumination system characterization for hyperspectral imaging

Near-infrared hyperspectral imaging is becoming a popular tool in the biomedical field, especially for detection and analysis of different types of cancers, analysis of skin burns and bruises, imaging of blood vessels and for many other applications. As in all imaging systems, proper illumination is crucial to attain optimal image quality that is needed for best performance of image analysis algorithms. In hyperspectral imaging based on filters (AOTF, LCTF and filter wheel) the acquired spectral signature has to be representative in all parts of the imaged object. Therefore, the whole object must be equally well illuminated - without shadows and specular reflections. As there are no restrictions imposed on the material and geometry of the object, the desired object illumination can only be achieved with completely diffuse illumination. In order to minimize shadows and specular reflections in diffuse illumination the light illuminating the object must be spatially, angularly and spectrally uniform. We present and test two diffuse illumination system designs that try to achieve optimal uniformity of the above mentioned properties. The illumination uniformity properties were measured with an AOTF based hyperspectral imaging system utilizing a standard white diffuse reflectance target and a specially designed calibration target for estimating the spatial and angular illumination uniformity.