Wide-field, full-field optical coherence microscopy for high-axial-resolution phase and amplitude imaging.

An original single-objective, full-field optical coherence microscopy system is reported that is capable of imaging both the phase and the amplitude of semi-transparent samples over a field of view of 17.5  mm×17.5  mm with an axial sectioning resolution of 1.5 μm. A special stack acquisition arrangement ensures optimal reachable imaging depth. Several phase-shifting interferometry algorithms for phase measurement with broadband light are compared theoretically and experimentally. Using the phase information, noninvasive depth-resolved topographic images of multilayer samples are produced to characterize each layer by measuring their defects and curvature with a nanometric scale precision. Using the amplitude information, tomographic images with a constant detection sensitivity of ∼80  dB through the entire field of view are obtained and applied to biological specimens.