Application of the Adaptive Wavelet Transform for Analysis of Blood Flow Oscillations in the Human Skin

An original method for the analysis of oscillations of cutaneous blood flow has been developed, which makes use of laser Doppler flowmetry (LDF) data and is based on the continuous wavelet transform and adaptive wavelet theory. The potential of the method has been demonstrated in experiments with the response of microcirculatory bed to the local linearly-increasing heating of a skin spot. The use of adaptive wavelet transform for analysis of peripheral blood flow oscillations enables one to process short (5 min) LDF signals in a wide frequency range (0.009-2 Hz). The major advantage of the method proposed, as compared to traditional wavelet analysis, has been shown to be a significant reduction of 'border effects'. This makes possible a correct low-frequency component analysis of much shorter LDF signals compared to those used in traditional wavelet processing.