A holographic interferometer, comprising: at least one imaging device capturing an interference pattern created by at least two light beams; and at least one aperture located in an optical path of at least one light beam of the at least two light beams; wherein the at least one aperture is located away from an axis of the at least one light beam, thus transmitting a subset of the at least one light beam collected at an angle range.

A method of generating a color image of a sample includes obtaining a plurality of low resolution holographic images of the sample using a color image sensor, the sample illuminated simultaneously by light from three or more distinct colors, wherein the illuminated sample casts sample holograms on the image sensor and wherein the plurality of low resolution holographic images are obtained by relative x, y, and z directional shifts between sample holograms and the image sensor. Pixel super-resolved holograms of the sample are generated at each of the three or more distinct colors. De-multiplexed holograms are generated from the pixel super-resolved holograms. Phase information is retrieved from the de-multiplexed holograms using a phase retrieval algorithm to obtain complex holograms. The complex hologram for the three or more distinct colors is digitally combined and back-propagated to a sample plane to generate the color image.

Laser 3D imaging techniques include splitting a laser temporally-modulated waveform of bandwidth B and duration D from a laser source into a reference beam and a target beam and directing the target beam onto a target. First data is collected, which indicates amplitude and phase of light relative to the reference beam received at each of a plurality of different times during a duration D at each optical detector of an array of one or more optical detectors perpendicular to the target beam. Steps are repeated for multiple sampling conditions, and the first data for the multiple sampling conditions are synthesized to form one or more synthesized sets. A 3D Fourier transform of each synthesized set forms a digital model of the target for each synthesized set with a down-range resolution based on the bandwidth B.

This disclosure discloses a method of creating a three-dimensional image of a sample using snapshot optical tomography. The method includes generating a plurality of beams incident on the sample simultaneously, acquiring a field image at a plane not conjugate to the sample plane using off-axis digital holography, extracting amplitude data and phase data for the field image, restoring the sharpness by backpropagating the field image using the extracted amplitude and phase data, acquiring a background image, extracting amplitude data and phase data for the background image, and reconstructing a three-dimensional image of the sample with the backpropagated field image and the background image. The method also includes arranging more than one imaging chains to remove the missing angle artefacts in optical tomography. Also disclosed are systems for performing the method.

Provided is a holographic microscope including an input optical system configured to emit polarized input beam, a first beam splitter configured to emit an object beam by reflecting a portion of the polarized input beam, and emit a reference beam by transmitting a remaining portion of the polarized input beam, a reference optical system configured to separate the reference beam into a first reference beam and a second reference beam, a camera configured to receive the first reference beam and the second reference beam and the object beam that is reflected by an inspection object, the camera including a micro polarizer array, wherein a first polarization axis of the first reference beam is perpendicular to a second polarization axis of the second reference beam.

A totagram is produced by an iterative spectral phase recovery process resulting in complete information recovery using special masks, without a reference beam. Using these special masking systems reduce computation time, number of masks, and number of iterations. The special masking system is (1) a unity mask together with one or more bipolar binary masks with elements equal to 1 and ?1, or (2) a unity mask together with one or more phase masks, or (3) a unity mask together with one pair of masks or more than one pair of masks having binary amplitudes of 0's and 1's, in which the masks in the pair are complementary to each other with respect to amplitude, or (4) one or more pairs of complementary masks with binary amplitudes of 0's and 1's without a unity mask.

There is described a method for processing data generated by a synthetic aperture imaging system, comprising: receiving raw data representative of electromagnetic signals reflected by a target area to be imaged; receiving a parameter change for the synthetic aperture imaging system; digitally correcting the raw data in accordance with the parameter change, thereby compensating for the parameter change in order to obtain corrected data; and generating an image of the target area using the corrected data.

The present invention can realize both a transmission type and a reflection type, and provides a holographic microscope which can exceed the resolution of the conventional optical microscope, a hologram data acquisition method for a high-resolution image, and a high-resolution hologram image reconstruction method. In-line spherical wave reference light (L) is recorded in a hologram (I.sub.LR) using spherical wave reference light (R), and an object light (O.sup.j) and an illumination light (Q.sup.j) are recorded in a hologram (I.sup.j.sub.OQR) using a spherical wave reference light (R) by illuminating the object with an illumination light (Q.sup.j, j=1, . . . , N) which is changed its incident direction. From those holograms, a hologram (J.sup.j.sub.OQL), from which the component of the reference light (R) is removed, is generated, and from the hologram, a light wave (h.sup.j) is generated. A light wave (c.sup.j) of the illumination light (Q.sup.j) is separated from the light wave (h.sup.j), and using its phase component (.sup.j=c.sup.j/|c.sup.j|), a phase adjustment reconstruction light wave is derived and added up as (H.sub.P=h.sup.j/.sup.j), and an object image (S.sub.P=|H.sub.P|.sup.2) is reconstructed.

A holographic interferometer, comprising: at least one imaging device capturing an interference pattern created by at least two light beams; and at least one aperture located in an optical path of at least one light beam of the at least two light beams; wherein the at least one aperture is located away from an axis of the at least one light beam, thus transmitting a subset of the at least one light beam collected at an angle range.

There is disclosed a novel system and method for achieving ultra-resolution, ultra-wide field-of-view multispectral and hyperspectral holographic microscopy and quantitative phase contrast microscopy. In an embodiment, the method comprises: providing a stationary illumination source; acquiring a plurality of low-resolution holograms of an image subject from different locations utilizing a subpixel sensor-scanning synthetic aperture mechanism whereby a detector scanning translationally, radially and/or rotationally; processing the acquired holograms utilizing a processing algorithm corresponding to the scanning motion of the detector used to acquire the holograms; and reconstructing a subpixel ultra-resolution image of the image subject based on the processed holograms; whereby, a desired synthetic aperture is achieved without loss of resolution. The multispectral and hyperspectral aspect is achieved in the novel system and method by use of different combination of illumination sources (i.e., LEDs, laser sources, broadband lamps, etc.) and wavelength selection mechanisms (i.e., bandpass spectral filters, acousto-optical and liquid crystal tunable filters, a dispersing element, etc.).