3D particle tracking using transport of intensity equation (TIE).

This article presents a simple and high-speed approach for tracking colloidal spheres in three dimensions. The method uses the curvature of the wavefront as determined by the transport of intensity equation (TIE) technique. Due to the fact that the TIE is applicable under partially coherent light, our technique is fully compatible with standard bright field microscopes, requiring no demanding environmental stability requirements or restrictions on the noise produced by related laser speckles. The method was validated experimentally to determine the sedimentation and diffusion coefficients of two different sizes of microspheres, 20 and 3 microns. The 3D position of the microspheres was calculated with an accuracy greater than 350 nm. Moreover, we examined the calculated 3D positions to determine the parameters of the microsphere interaction with its surrounding media, such as the sedimentation and diffusion coefficients. The results show that the measured sedimentation and diffusion of the microspheres have a good agreement with predicted values of about 2% and 10%, respectively, demonstrating the robustness of our proposed method.

3D imaging using scanning diffractometry.

Imaging of cells is a challenging problem as they do not appreciably change the intensity of the illuminating light. Interferometry-based methods to do this task suffer from high sensitivity to environmental vibrations. We introduce scanning diffractometry as a simple non-contact and vibration-immune methodology for quantitative phase imaging. Fresnel diffractometry by a phase step has led to several applications such as high-precision measurements of displacement. Additional scanning may lead to 3D imaging straightforwardly. We apply the technique to acquire 3D images of holographic grating, red blood cell, neuron, and sperm cell. Either visibility of the diffraction fringes or the positions of extrema may be used for phase change detection. The theoretical analysis through the Fresnel diffraction from one-dimensional phase step is presented and the experimental results are validated with digital holographic microscopy. The presented technique can be suggested to serve as a robust device for 3D phase imaging and biomedical measurements.

Diffractometry-based vortex beams fractional topological charge measurement.

In this Letter, we investigate the Fresnel diffraction of vortex beams from a phase plate and propose a novel (to the best of our knowledge) method to determine the fractional part of the topological charge of vortex beams. When a vortex beam with a fractional topological charge illuminates the edge region of a transparent plate, the visibility of the diffraction pattern on two sides of the beam is different. Rotation of the phase plate changes the visibility on the left and right sides of the beam, periodically. By measuring three consecutive angles of the minimum visibilities, the fractional part of the topological charge is obtained. The proposed method is verified experimentally and is shown to be independent of the phase plate and vortex beam parameters. The precision of the method is obtained better than 0.01.

SSPIM: a beam shaping toolbox for structured selective plane illumination microscopy.

Selective plane illumination microscopy (SPIM) represents a preferred method in dynamic tissue imaging, because it combines high spatiotemporal resolution with low phototoxicity. The OpenSPIM system was developed to provide an accessible and flexible microscope set-up for non-specialist users. Here, we report Structured SPIM (SSPIM), which offers an open-source, user-friendly and compact toolbox for beam shaping to be applied within the OpenSPIM platform. SSPIM is able to generate digital patterns for a wide range of illumination beams including static and spherical Gaussian beams, Bessel beams and Airy beams by controlling the pattern of a Spatial Light Modulator (SLM). In addition, SSPIM can produce patterns for structured illumination including incoherent and coherent array beams and tiling for all types of the supported beams. We describe the workflow of the toolbox and demonstrate its application by comparing experimental data with simulation results for a wide range of illumination beams. Finally, the capability of SSPIM is investigated by 3D imaging of Drosophila embryos using scanned Gaussian, Bessel and array beams. SSPIM provides an accessible toolbox to generate and optimize the desired beam patterns and helps adapting the OpenSPIM system towards a wider range of biological samples.

Fresnel diffraction due to phase gradient singularity.

In this Letter, a singularity in the phase gradient is introduced as a new origin of the diffraction from phase objects. The continuity in the amplitude and phase of the wave and the singularity in the phase gradient are assumed to describe this phenomenon. Fresnel diffraction of Fresnel double mirror and biprism are studied as practical examples, and the diffracted intensity distribution is calculated. We show that the intensity of the diffracted field varies with an almost constant period along the average propagation direction. Using this value and the fringe spacing of the interference pattern on a plane normal to the average propagation direction, the angle between two interfering beams and the wavelength of the incident light could be simultaneously derived. The diffraction pattern of the Fresnel double mirror and Fresnel biprism were obtained experimentally, which were in good agreement with the theoretical results.

Digital holographic microscopy for 3D surface characterization of polymeric nanocomposites.

The aim of this paper is to introduce digital holographic microscopy (DHM) as a non-contact, inexpensive, and non-abrasive method for 3D surface characterization of polymeric nanocomposites. A common-path and vibration-immune Mirau system with a microsphere-assisted arrangement is utilized to increase the lateral resolution of the images. The characterization is performed through the measurement of roughness parameters of the surfaces, which are derived from the recorded holograms. Pure poly(triazole-amide-imide) (PTAI) and PTAI nanocomposite reinforeced with surface modified TiO2 nanoparticles (MN-TiO2) are used and compared. The experimental results show the potential of the presented method to serve as an alternative for expensive surface measurement devices such as stylus profiler and atomic force microscope (AFM) for polymeric surface characterization.

Digital holography based submicron thermometry.

Here we introduce a phase-shifting digital holography-based method to determine the temperature profile around an irradiated (sub-)micron spherical bead. The method utilizes a Mach-Zehnder interferometer implemented into an open setup microscope. The results of irradiated gold spheres with diameter of 400 nm and also silver-coated micron-sized silica beads embedded in silicone oil are presented. We show that the applied method is able to accurately determine the surface temperature with accuracy of 1 °C. Our experimental results perfectly confirm the theoretical prediction of temperature profile around the irradiated bead.

Reconstructing the phase distribution of two interfering wavefronts by analysis of their nonlocalized fringes with an iterative method.

This paper presents a technique for reconstructing two interfering wavefronts by analyzing their 3D interference field pattern. The method is based on the numerical inverse problem and will present a robust algorithm for reconstructing of wavefronts. Several simulations are done to validate the proposed method.