Apparatus and method for ranging and noise reduction of low coherence interferometry LCI and optical coherence tomography OCT signals by parallel detection of spectral bands
First Claim
1. An apparatus for optical imaging, comprising:
- a) an interferometer;
b) a first arrangement providing at least one electro-magnetic radiation to the interferometer and a first signal, and generating a path length difference that is a fraction of a ranging depth of the interferometer;
c) a spectral separating second arrangement that receives a second signal from the interferometer and splits the second signal into a further signal having a plurality of optical frequencies, wherein the spectral separating unit obtains the second signal based on information provided by the first signal; and
d) a plurality of detectors, each detector configured to detect at least a portion of the optical frequencies received from the spectral separating second arrangement.
2 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
Apparatus and method for increasing the sensitivity in the detection of optical coherence tomography and low coherence interferometry (“LCI”) signals by detecting a parallel set of spectral bands, each band being a unique combination of optical frequencies. The LCI broad bandwidth source is split into N spectral bands. The N spectral bands are individually detected and processed to provide an increase in the signal-to-noise ratio by a factor of N. Each spectral band is detected by a separate photo detector and amplified. For each spectral band the signal is band pass filtered around the signal band by analog electronics and digitized, or, alternatively, the signal may be digitized and band pass filtered in software. As a consequence, the shot noise contribution to the signal is reduced by a factor equal to the number of spectral bands. The signal remains the same. The reduction of the shot noise increases the dynamic range and sensitivity of the system.
-
Citations
18 Claims
-
1. An apparatus for optical imaging, comprising:
-
a) an interferometer; b) a first arrangement providing at least one electro-magnetic radiation to the interferometer and a first signal, and generating a path length difference that is a fraction of a ranging depth of the interferometer; c) a spectral separating second arrangement that receives a second signal from the interferometer and splits the second signal into a further signal having a plurality of optical frequencies, wherein the spectral separating unit obtains the second signal based on information provided by the first signal; and d) a plurality of detectors, each detector configured to detect at least a portion of the optical frequencies received from the spectral separating second arrangement. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18)
-
Specification