Monte-Carlo model for speckle contrast imaging

Speckle contrast imaging has been shown to be useful in measuring blood flow in vivo. Recently spatial frequency domain imaging has been combined with speckle contrast to provide information about the depth of the blood vessels. Here we develop a Monte-Carlo model for speckle contrast imaging using a pattern of binary illumination bars. Our model is constructed in such a way that we can simulate different time steps in the imaging process from a single Monte-Carlo run. We show that the technique can measure flow using either spatial or temporal contrast, and that differences in depth can be seen in the pattern of speckle contrast. With this tool, we can investigate different processing algorithms to optimize the imaging process and extract useful depth information. Further work will exploit the harmonic frequencies in the Fourier transform of the binary bar chart.