| 摘要 |
<p>An apparatus for measuring the fluorescent lifetime (10) of an unknown fluorescent sample (12), such as a biological liquid, without the requirement of manual intervention or a separate reference standard. An energetic light beam having its low energy component filtered out is shined on the sample (12). An optical detector (30) is positioned such that the intensity of the components of the light beam reflected from the sample (12) reaching the detector (30) is substantially minimized but light remitted and/or fluoresced by the sample (12) does reach the detector (30) with non-trivial intensity. A low-pass filter (28) is placed between the sample (12) and the detector (30) to isolate the high-energy remitted light component coming from the sample (12) and having the same phase as the original energetic beam used to stimulate fluorescence, and a high-pass filter (28) is placed between the sample (12) and the detector (30) to isolate the lower-energy fluoresced light component coming from the sample (12). The phases of each component are then measured and compared to determine the phase shift of the light fluoresced by the sample (12), and the phase shift data is used to calculate the fluorescent lifetime (10) of the sample (12).</p> |
