Nano-sensitive optical coherence tomography (nsOCT) for depth resolved characterization of 3D submicron structure

Sergey Alexandrov; Hrebesh Subhash; Azhar Zam; Martin Leahy

doi:10.1117/12.2041921

4 March 2014 Nano-sensitive optical coherence tomography (nsOCT) for depth resolved characterization of 3D submicron structure

Sergey Alexandrov, Hrebesh Subhash, Azhar Zam, Martin Leahy

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 8934, Optical Coherence Tomography and Coherence Domain Optical Methods in Biomedicine XVIII; 89340Z (2014) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2041921
Event: SPIE BiOS, 2014, San Francisco, California, United States

Abstract

Nowadays optical coherence tomography (OCT) is a rapidly developing technique with various applications, including biomedical imaging and diagnosis. One of the main shortcomings of current OCT techniques is low resolution and sensitivity to structural changes (typically about 10 microns). The best ultra-high resolution OCT techniques demonstrate sensitivity to structural changes and depth resolution of about 1 micron. Since many applications of interest (such as cancer) depend on structural changes at the nanoscale, OCT would definitely benefit from improved structural resolution and sensitivity. A new spectral encoding of spatial frequency (SESF) approach for quantitative characterization of the structure with nanoscale sensitivity has been developed recently. Ability to map axial structural information into each pixel of a 2D image with nanoscale sensitivity has been demonstrated and application of this approach to 3D microscopic imaging has been discussed. Here we present a novel technique, nano-sensitive OCT (nsOCT), to dramatically increase sensitivity of the OCT to structural changes. We propose to directly translate information about particular structure from Fourier domain to the image domain and map this information into the corresponding location within the 3D OCT image. As a result, submicron axial structure can be visualized and nanoscale structural alterations for each volume of interest within the 3D OCT image can be detected. Preliminary results show that using nsSOCT, based on conventional spectral domain OCT system with resolution 30 x 30 x 12 μm, it is possible to detect structural changes within scattering sample as small as 30 nm.

Citation Download Citation

Sergey Alexandrov, Hrebesh Subhash, Azhar Zam, and Martin Leahy "Nano-sensitive optical coherence tomography (nsOCT) for depth resolved characterization of 3D submicron structure", Proc. SPIE 8934, Optical Coherence Tomography and Coherence Domain Optical Methods in Biomedicine XVIII, 89340Z (4 March 2014); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2041921

ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE

INSTITUTIONAL
Select your institution to access the SPIE Digital Library.

SELECT YOUR INSTITUTION

PERSONAL
Sign in with your SPIE account to access your personal subscriptions or to use specific features such as save to my library, sign up for alerts, save searches, etc.

PERSONAL SIGN IN

No SPIE Account? Create one

PURCHASE THIS CONTENT

SUBSCRIBE TO DIGITAL LIBRARY

50 downloads per 1-year subscription

Members: $195

Non-members: $335 ADD TO CART

25 downloads per 1 - year subscription

Members: $145

Non-members: $250 ADD TO CART

PURCHASE SINGLE ARTICLE

Includes PDF, HTML & Video, when available

Members: $17.00

Non-members: $21.00 ADD TO CART

PROCEEDINGS
12 PAGES

DOWNLOAD PAPER SAVE TO MY LIBRARY

GET CITATION

RIGHTS & PERMISSIONS

Get copyright permission Get copyright permission on Copyright Marketplace

KEYWORDS

Optical coherence tomography

Spatial frequencies

Scattering

3D image processing

Imaging systems

Spectral resolution

Computer programming

Show All Keywords

Keywords/Phrases

Search In:

Publication Years