According to an aspect of the present inventive concept there is provided an imaging system for imaging of a sample, comprising a light source, an interference filter and a detector, the light source generates illumination light of a single wavelength to induce elastic scattering of the light by the sample, the interference filter selectively reduces transmittance of light having an incident angle on the interference filter corresponding to non-scattered light, the detector is configured to detect a two-dimensional representation of the elastically scattered light transmitted by the interference filter.

An ultrasound emitter launches an ultrasonic signal into a diffuse medium such as tissue. The diffuse medium is illuminated with an infrared illumination signal. activating an ultrasound emitter to launch an ultrasonic signal into a diffuse medium. An infrared reference beam is interfered with an infrared exit signal having an infrared wavelength that is the same as the infrared illumination signal. An infrared image is captured of the interference of the infrared reference beam with the infrared exit signal.

Systems and methods for sub-aperture correlation based wavefront measurement in a thick sample and correction as a post processing technique for interferometric imaging to achieve near diffraction limited resolution are described. Theory, simulation and experimental results are presented for the case of full field interference microscopy. The inventive technique can be applied to any coherent interferometric imaging technique and does not require knowledge of any system parameters. In one embodiment of the present application, a fast and simple way to correct for defocus aberration is described. A variety of applications for the method are presented.

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.

A system and method to produce a hologram of a single plane of a three dimensional object includes an electromagnetic radiation assembly to elicit electromagnetic radiation from a single plane of said object, and an assembly to direct the elicited electromagnetic radiation toward a hologram-forming assembly. The hologram-forming assembly creates a hologram that is recorded by an image capture assembly and then further processed to create maximum resolution images free of an inherent holographic artifact.

A system and method to produce a hologram of a single plane of a three dimensional object includes an electromagnetic radiation assembly to elicit electromagnetic radiation from a single plane of said object, and an assembly to direct the elicited electromagnetic radiation toward a hologram-forming assembly. The hologram-forming assembly creates a hologram that is recorded by an image capture assembly and then further processed to create maximum resolution images free of an inherent holographic artifact.

An ultrasound emitter launches an ultrasonic signal into a diffuse medium such as tissue. The diffuse medium is illuminated with an infrared illumination signal. activating an ultrasound emitter to launch an ultrasonic signal into a diffuse medium. An infrared reference beam is interfered with an infrared exit signal having an infrared wavelength that is the same as the infrared illumination signal. An infrared image is captured of the interference of the infrared reference beam with the infrared exit signal.

A method for defect inspection of a transparent substrate comprises (a) providing an optical system for performing a diffraction process of object wave passing through a transparent substrate, (b) interfering and wavefront recording for the diffracted object wave and a reference wave to reconstruct the defect complex images (including amplitude and phase) of the transparent substrate, (c) characteristics analyzing, features classifying and sieving for the defect complex images of the transparent substrate, and (d) creating defect complex images database based-on the defect complex images for comparison and detection of the defect complex images of the transparent substrate.

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.

A Volume Bragg grating (VBG) is placed in the back of a collimating lens, the incident angle between exposure light beam and the Volume Bragg grating is equal to the Bragg angle of the Volume Bragg grating. A photodetector is placed in the 1 grade transmission diffraction light path of the Volume Bragg grating which the exposure light beam is emitted to. The pinhole filter is moved back and forth along an optical axis and the reading of the photodetector is observed in real time. When the reading of the photodetector is maximum, fix the pinhole filter and keep the distance between the first pinhole filter and the first collimating lens a constant. The method for adjusting the self-collimation optical path is provided, using the Volume Bragg grating to detect the parallelism of self-collimation light and substituting for a traditional Moire pattern adjustment method.