Spectrally encoded confocal microscopy.

An endoscope-compatible, submicrometer-resolution scanning confocal microscopy imaging system is presented. This approach, spectrally encoded confocal microscopy (SECM), uses a quasi-monochromatic light source and a transmission diffraction grating to detect the reflectivity simultaneously at multiple points along a transverse line within the sample. Since this method does not require fast spatial scanning within the probe, the equipment can be miniaturized and incorporated into a catheter or endoscope. Confocal images of an electron microscope grid were acquired with SECM to demonstrate the feasibility of this technique.