Development and characterization of planar LED arrays for medical applications

Abstract

LEDs have a growing impact on the emerging field of life science. An already established method is the photodynamic inactivation (PDI), where photoactivated photosensitizers (usually dyes) inhibit or kill cells. A new approach develops a method via ex vitro PDI. In this work, we develop and characterize an LED array for this application. To verify the utility, homogeneity and intensity are measured for different distances. The characterization includes an angle dependent beam profile measurement of a single LED and measurements of homogeneity and intensity for the LED array as a function of distance. These 3D intensity profiles were compared to simulations based on the single LED beam profile. The homogeneity measurements are in accordance with the simulations and show that homogeneity and intensity of the array are sufficient for the approach of PDI. The simulation is capable to make a quantitative prediction for the intensity distribution of the array.