Year: 2020
Type: article
Abstract: Intensity levels allowed by safety standards (ICNIRP or ANSI) limit the amount of light that can be used in a clinical setting to image highly scattering or absorptive tissues with optical coherence tomography (OCT). To achieve high-sensitivity imaging at low intensity levels, we adapt a detection scheme-which is used in quantum optics for providing information about spectral correlations of photons-into a standard spectral domain OCT system. This detection scheme is based on the concept of dispersive Fourier transformation, where a fiber introduces a wavelength-dependent time delay measured by a single-pixel detector, usually a high-speed photoreceiver. Here, we use a fast superconducting single-photon detector SSPD as a single-pixel detector and obtain images of a glass stack and a slice of onion at the intensity levels of the order of 10 pW. We also provide a formula for a depth-dependent sensitivity falloff in such a detection scheme, which can be treated as a temporal equivalent of diffraction-grating-based spectrometers.
Source: Optics Letters
DOI: 10.1364/ol.393162
Authors: Sylwia M. Kolenderska, Frédérique Vanholsbeeck, Piotr Kolenderski
Language: English
Subfield: Biomedical Engineering
Field: Engineering
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
Award: G6505080602
OpenAlex ID: W3014393303