Lensless Fourier holography for digital holographic interferometry on biological samples

Digital holography as a tool for highly sensitive, interferometric non-destructive testing has several advantages compared to holographic measurements based on conventional storage media like an all-digital processing and a direct access to the phase of the object wave. Experimental results of interferometric investigations of heart valve bio-prostheses with a setup for lensless Fourier holography are presented which demonstrate that this technique is applicable to such biological samples with their wet and unstable surfaces. Limitations on size and resolution of the reconstructed object caused by the properties of the CCD sensor are discussed.     

Monitoring micro-mechanical changes in electronic circuit boards with digital holographic interferometry

The micrometric changes over the size of the objects produced by the temperature variations can create deleterious effects; the decoupling of soldering points in electronic circuits is one of them. In this work, we present a system based on digital holographic interferometry to quantify the magnitude of the changes produced on an electronic circuit board as it operates at very low electric currents. For the system to work, two digital holograms of the object are registered for different temperatures. These holograms are reconstructed numerically in a computer by using Fresnel's approximation to make a phase difference map. This map is converted into micrometer size variations by means of a lookup table. The implemented system allows for determining mechanical deformations in the range of 0.5–4 μm for a regular electronic circuit board drawing an electric current from 10 μA to 50 μA.     

Measuring and calculating geometrical parameters of marine plankton using digital laser holographic imaging

The purpose of this paper is to develop an approach using digital laser holographic imaging for measuring and calculating geometrical parameters of marine plankton. It is very important for study of marine plankton and it facilitates the analysis of marine plankton. Using this approach, we obtained geometrical parameters of marine plankton including perimeter, equivalent diameter, lateral size and so on. It is found that a measurement aberration is less than 8% for copepods sample by using collimating reference wave.     

An experimental investigation of three-dimensional particle aggregation using digital holographic microscopy

The tendency of particles to aggregate depends on particle-particle and particle-fluid interactions. These interactions can be characterized but it requires accurate 3D measurements of particle distributions. We introduce the application of an off-axis digital holographic microscopy for measuring distributions of dense micrometer (2 μm) particles in a liquid solution. We demonstrate that digital holographic microscopy is capable of recording the instantaneous 3D position of particles in a flow volume. A new reconstruction method that aids identification of particle images was used in this work. About 62% of the expected number of particles within the interrogated flow volume was detected. Based on the 3D position of individual particles, the tendency of particle to aggregate is investigated. Results show that relatively few particles (around 5–10 of a cohort of 1500) were aggregates. This number did not change significantly with time.     

Polarization phase shifting in digital holographic microscopy

In the present work we have made use of polarization phase shifting in digital holographic microscopy (DHM) for three dimensional phase profiling of transmissive and reflecting microscopic samples. The Mach–Zehnder arrangement with proper polarizing elements (polarizer-masked cube beam splitter, quarter wave plate and a linear polarizer) is used for recording the phase-shifted digital holograms. The suggested procedure is simple and accurate and obviates the need of piezo devices for phase shifting. The phase profile of the specimen is reconstructed from the holograms by using standard phase shifting algorithms.     

Time-average holographic interferometry with a sinusoidally modulated laser diode

Laser diodes have the features of a single-mode operation and a frequency tunability. Holographic interferometry is described for investigating the vibrating amplitude and phase with a frequency-modulated laser diode. Sinusoidal wavelength change by varying laser injection current produces the sinusoidal phase modulation of relative phase difference between the reference and vibrating object paths. Holograms are made by time-average exposure of three-type recording modes with a laser diode. The phase of vibrating object is extracted from the measurements of Bessel-type fringe irradiances in three kinds of time-average holographic reconstruction. Experimental results of phase and amplitude for a vibrating cantilever object are shown.     

Impact of an extended source in laser ablation using pulsed digital holographic interferometry and modelling

Pulsed digital holographic interferometry has been used to study the effect of the laser spot diameter on the shock wave generated in the ablation process of an Nd:YAG laser pulse on a Zn target under atmospheric pressure. For different laser spot diameters and time delays, the propagation of the expanding vapour and of the shock wave were recorded by intensity maps calculated using the recorded digital holograms. From the latter, the phase maps, the refractive index and the density field can be derived. A model was developed that approaches the density distribution, in particular the ellipsoidal expansion characteristics. The induced shock wave has an ellipsoid shape that approaches a sphere for decreasing spot diameter. The ellipsoidal shock waves have almost the same centre offset towards the laser beam and the same aspect ratio for different time steps. The model facilitates the derivation of the particle velocity field. The method provides valuable quantitative results that are discussed, in particular in comparison with the simpler point source explosion theory.     

Determination of fractional fringe orders in holographic interferometry using polarization phase shifting

A simple method to determine the fringe orders at points between fringes in holographic interferometry is presented. The method is based on the use of two reference beams in the recording and reconstruction of the interferogram. A phase difference is imposed between the reference beams on reconstruction through polarization elements. The interferogram is viewed through a polarizer to recombine the images. The fractional fringe order is obtained from the angle through which the polarizer is rotated to shift the adjacent fringe to the point of interest.     

Comparison of the laser ablation process on Zn and Ti using pulsed digital holographic interferometry

Pulsed digital holographic interferometry has been used to compare the laser ablation process of a Q-switched Nd-YAG laser pulse (wavelength 1064 nm, pulse duration 12 ns) on two different metals (Zn and Ti) under atmospheric air pressure. Digital holograms were recorded for different time delays using collimated laser light (532 nm) passed through the volume along the target. Numerical data of the integrated refractive index field were calculated and presented as phase maps. Intensity maps were calculated from the recorded digital holograms and are used to calculate the attenuation of the probing laser beam by the ablated plume. The different structures of the plume, namely streaks normal to the surface for Zn in contrast to absorbing regions for Ti, indicates that different mechanisms of laser ablation could happen for different metals for the same laser settings and surrounding gas. At a laser fluence of 5 J/cm², phase explosion appears to be the ablation mechanism in case of Zn, while for Ti normal vaporization seems to be the dominant mechanism.     

Examination of the upper measurement limit in displacement measurement using fringe compensation in digital holography

Digital holography is a widely used method for displacement measurement in coherent optical metrology. An obvious limit of the method is that too large displacements result in dense fringes, so the fringes are practically invisible. The maximum number of contour fringes in displacement measurement is limited, because the cameras are discrete devices and sampling theory plays an important role. Because of the limited measurement range, compensation methods are promising tools for practical measurements. It can be shown that the practical measurement range can be extended above the Nyquist sampling limit. Compensation methods can be digital, because digital holographic interferometry operates with images recorded with a digital camera. In our research work the upper measurement range of fringe compensation method was examined. Our goal was to perform automatic compensation even if the displacement is higher than the measurement range of the basic method. The operation of the automatic fringe compensation method was based on the combination of two types of out-of-plane displacement measurements with different sensitivities.     

Pulsed digital holographic interferometry by using a flexible fiber endoscope

A system based on digital holographic interferometry in combination with a flexible fiber endoscope is described. A Q-switched pulsed laser is used. Two digital holograms of the test object, corresponding to the two laser pulses, are captured at separate video frames of a CCD-camera, transferred in a frame grabber and further processed in a PC. If the object undergoes a deformation during the interval between the two laser pulses (usually in the range of 5–600 μs), a fringe pattern will result from the difference between the two holograms. This fringe pattern has the information needed to evaluate quantitatively the amount of the deformation. A compact system has been developed to be used for various applications, both mechanical and biological, where measurements need to be performed at “hidden” surfaces or inside more or less closed objects. The quality of the results obtained by using mechanical objects is usually better than for biological objects. This can be explained easily by the fact that a biological surface is much more complex, in particular some parts of the surface may reflect the light well whereas some other parts may absorb it. Experimental results are presented.     

Parallel-quadrature phase-shifting digital holographic microscopy using polarization beam splitter

We present a digital holography microscopy technique based on a parallel-quadrature phase-shifting method. Two π/2 phase-shifted holograms are recorded simultaneously using polarization phase-shifting principle, slightly off-axis recording geometry, and two identical CCD sensors. The parallel phase-shifting is realized by combining circularly polarized object beam with a 45° degree polarized reference beam through a polarizing beam splitter. DC term is eliminated by subtracting the two holograms from each other and the object information is reconstructed after selecting the frequency spectrum of the real image. Both amplitude and phase object reconstruction results are presented. Simultaneous recording eliminates phase errors caused by mechanical vibrations and air turbulences. The slightly off-axis recording geometry with phase-shifting allows a much larger dimension of the spatial filter for reconstruction of the object information. This leads to better reconstruction capability than traditional off-axis holography.     

Surface contouring by phase-shifting digital holography

Surface contouring by phase-shifting digital holography is proposed that provides surface height from a change of reconstructed object phases due to the tilt of object illumination. Surface height from a reference plane is directly obtained from the phase change. Its sensitivity depends on the tilt angle as well as on the initial incident angle. By proper selection of the angles we can derive surface height without phase unwrapping. The sensitivity can be enhanced by increasing the tilt angle. Then we need phase unwrapping that is sensitive to noise due to laser speckles in the reconstructed images. This noise could be suppressed by selecting phase values at points of the maximum product of amplitudes before and after the illumination change in the course of data reduction from 1024×1024 to 512×512 and by selecting paths for phase unwrapping by looking for the intensity maximum. The observed height resolution is 20 μm. Effects of numerical focusing have also been investigated. The present method has the same sensitivity as the fringe projection method, but it has larger measurement depth and is also applicable to the deformation measurement with the same arrangement.     

Realization of an optical interferometer based on holographic optics for real-time testing of phase objects

The paper describes a simple and cost effective method for the realization of an optical interferometer based on holographic optics, which use minimal bulk optical components. The optical arrangement in the proposed method involves a very simple alignment procedure and inexpensive holographic recording material is used in the formation of holographic optical elements. The proposed interferometer set-up is quite suitable for performing optical test studies on phase (transparent) objects in real-time. Recording schemes for the formation of holographic optical elements and the related technique for the realization of the interferometer set-up along with the experimental results have been presented.     

Quantitative visualization of the laser induced plume behavior using quasi-heterodyne holographic interferometry

It is very important that we understand the dynamic behaviors of the laser induced plume in welding, because the laser induced plume has considerable effects on welding efficiency and the quality of materials. Many experimental studies have been performed in order to observe the plume behaviors using a visualization method. In this paper, we describe the visualization and quantification of the laser induced plumes by pulse holographic interferometry. A pulsed Nd:YAG laser was used for the generation of laser induced plume and a Q-switched Ruby laser was employed to record the weld plume. For qualitative visualization of the laser induced plume, we used the double-exposure holographic interferometry. Then, we chose the quasi-heterodyne holographic interferometry with the dual-reference-beam and phase shifting in order to visualize the plume quantitatively. The experimental results show the visible behavior of the laser induced plume according to a change in the output power of the pulsed Nd:YAG laser and the time delay of Q-switched Ruby laser. Finally, we obtained the quantitative results by using the dual-reference-beam.     

Fast image-processing technique in phase-shifting holographic interferometry

A fast image-processing method in phase shifting holographic interferometry is proposed, in which the complicated phase calculation is completed with a logic circuit and look-up table. An electronic circuit was designed for the purpose. With these techniques, the processing time can be greatly reduced.     

Internal inspection of semi-transparent objects by digital holographic micro-tomography

The combined use of digital holographic microscopy and computer tomography, here named digital holographic micro-tomography, is used to examine the interior of transparent channels. The proposed method is used to identify internal obstacles inside of transparent troughs having slightly different refractive index. The method is based in the acquisition of a set of digital holograms of the specimen whereas it is axially rotated from 0° to 180°. The phase differences retrieved from the obtained holograms are the inputs to a computerised axial tomography procedure. The technique has been numerically modelled in order to find the optimal tomographic conditions and also to realise the minimum difference of refractive index the method could detect. The obtained results show the feasibility of the proposed method for the non-destructive evaluation of transparent micro-objects.     

Self-aligned imaging system using phase conjugate readout from elementary holographic grating

We propose a self-aligned imaging system (SAIS) using phase conjugate readout from an elementary holographic grating. The SAIS provides a huge amount of interconnections between a lot of points on two corresponding imaging planes without troublesome mechanical alignment. In the SAIS, a hologram for one-to-one interconnection is used for many-to-many interconnections. In addition, the SAIS has the capability of correcting aberration. Preliminary experiments verify the principle and the capability of the SAIS.     

4-D imaging of fluid flow with digital in-line holographic microscopy

The large depth of field of digital in-line holographic microscopy (DIHM) with numerical reconstruction provides an ideal tool for the study of microfluidic phenomena. As indicators of the flow patterns we use latex microspheres and also red blood cells whose three-dimensional trajectories and velocities can easily be measured as a function of time with subsecond and micron resolution. We demonstrate the efficiency of DIHM by showing 3-D views of the flow patterns around big spheres in various geometric arrangements.     

Phase reconstruction in lensless digital in-line holographic microscopy

The phase reconstruction in a digital in-line holographic microscopy is compared using two numerical reconstruction methods. The first method uses one Fourier transform and second one uses three Fourier transforms. It is shown that the latter method gives improved object phase reconstruction as compared to the former.