[Study on the application of bio-heat transfer science to the quantitative analysis of tongue inspection].

OBJECTIVE To research the mechanism of the tongue inspection in traditional Chinese medicine and to study the special relationship between temperature distribution of the tongue and the tongue color. METHODS The temperature field of human and pig's tongue was measured by infrared thermal vision system and thermal-couple probe. The blood perfusion rates in the human tongue and the pig's tongue were obtained with laser Doppler rheometer and CBI-8000 physiology research system. The temperature field of the profile of tongue was computed by numerical method. RESULTS The quantitative curve of the temperature distribution on the surface of tongue and the relationship between temperature and blood perfusion rate were obtained. And the temperature in the profile of tongue was obtained by finite element method. CONCLUSION The research involves that the different tongue color can reflect different tongue temperature and blood perfusion rate. This proved that it is acceptable to apply the bio-heat transfer theory to the tongue inspection research. The results provided a new method to research the tongue inspection in traditional Chinese medicine.