Determination of the refractive index of highly scattering human tissue by optical coherence tomography

We describe two new techniques, based on optical coherence tomography (OCT), for determining the refractive index of highly scattering human tissue. We obtained refractive indices of in vitro human tissue, using OCT to measure the physical and optical path lengths of the sample. We obtained measurements of the refractive index of in vitro and in vivo human tissue, using OCT to track the focal length shift that results from translating the focus along the optic axis within the tissue. The refractive indices of human skin, adipose, and muscle were measured and compared with previously published estimates.