A novel approach to non-invasive glucose measurement by mid-infrared spectroscopy:: The combination of quantum cascade lasers (QCL) and photoacoustic detection

True non-invasive glucose measurement procedures are presently not available to the diabetic patient. There have been many different approaches without useful results. Here, we present a new concept to measure glucose non-invasively based on mid-infrared spectroscopy (MIR) which overcomes the difficulties of other methods. Basically it consists of the combination of QCL derived radiation and photoacoustic detection of absorption. Theoretical considerations and first in vivo results show that this approach will lead to a true non-invasive specific glucose measurement. (c) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.