In one aspect, the present invention generally provides methods for characterizing mineralization of a material, e.g., a biomaterial, by illuminating the material with radiation and analyzing radiation scattered from the material in response to the illumination. For example, in some embodiments, a material can be illuminated with polarized radiation at a plurality of wavelengths and the elastically scattered radiation corresponding to two or more of those wavelengths can be collected at two polarizations: one parallel and the other perpendicular to the illumination polarization. A differential intensity of the scattered radiation at the two polarizations can be analyzed as a function of wavelength to obtain information regarding the morphology of mineral deposits in the sample. Further, the total scattered radiation can be analyzed to derive information regarding the level of mineralization.