Quantitative temporal speckle contrast imaging for tissue mechanics

We demonstrate through a series of simulations that by parameterizing the temporal speckle contrast statistic from a sequence of translating speckle images on a number of experimental constants, the local temporal contrast can be used to quantitatively assess local motion, provided that the spatial and temporal Nyquist sampling criteria are both met. We develop a simple exponential model for quantifying speckle motion for speckle patterns that display arbitrary intensity statistics and provide suggestions for optimizing both the experimental acquisition of speckle data and the temporal contrast analysis of the data. The confounding effects of un-correlated noise are also discussed. The model is demonstrated by applying it to an optical coherence tomography image sequence of an engineered tissue construct undergoing dynamic compression. Applications to tissue mechanics are shown, although the discussion is equally relevant for fluid motion studies. (C) 2007 Optical Society of America.