Structural characterization of hair fiber by optical coherence tomography (OCT)

In this work we use the optical coherence tomography (OCT) technique to produce in vitro transversal section images of human hair. It was possible to identify in the A-scan protocol its principal structures: cuticle, cortex and medulla. The mean diameter of medulla was 29 ± 7 μm and hair diameter was 122 ± 16 μm in our samples of standard Afro-ethnic hair. We also compared the OCT signal before and after chemical treatment with 18% w/w ammonium thioglycolate solution. After chemical treatment, it was not possible to identify the main structures of hair fiber, due the index matching promoted by deleterious action of chemical agent. A tridimensional image was built starting from 601 cross-sectional images (slices). Each slice was taken in steps of 6.0 μm at 8 frames per second, and the whole 3D image was built in 60 seconds.