Diagnosis of Sickle Cell Anemia Using Laser Emission Spectroscopy

Abstract

In this research,the laser emission spectroscopy was utilized to diagnose the sickle cell anemia among five samples of blood;one normal and four with sickle cell anemia. The five samples were irradiated by diode laser of 532 nm wavelength and 100 mW output power. The emission spectra of the five samples were recorded and compared. The results showed that, two peaks in the emission spectrum of normal blood sample were appeared,the first one is attributed to hemoglobinA_(2 )while the second is due to hemoglobin A. Three peaks in the emission spectrum of sickle cell anemia samples were recorded, these peaks are attributed to hemoglobinA_2, F and S which appeared only in the sickle cell anemia samples. The three peaks are considered as characteristics of the sickle cell anemia. The wavelength of the emission peak of hemoglobin S was red shifted with the increasing in the total hemoglobin, and the intensity ofthe peak of hemoglobin F was increased with decreasing the amount of total hemoglobin. Also, the results showed that, the first peak in the emission spectrum of normal blood sample indicated the haemoglobinA_2with low intensity, and the second peak is attributed to hemoglobin A with high intensity. The three peaks observed in the emission of sickle cell anemia, indicated thehaemoglobin S as the major haemoglobin component with a little proportion of haemoglobinA_2 and a variable proportion of haemoglobin F. This study concluded that laser emission spectroscopy succeeded in the diagnosis of sickle cell anemia compared with the healthy blood samples.