Experimental methods to quantify particle positional and displacement uncertainty along the depth direction in digital in-line holography

Abstract

Digital in-line holography (DIH) is an optical technique for the measurement of threedimensional (3D) particle fields. Although DIH has many potential applications, widespread use of the technique is hindered by relatively high uncertainty in the measured particle depth. Here we present new experimental methods to quantify the depth uncertainty by comparing measured particle trajectories to predicted trajectories for a simple, rotational flow. When using the hybrid method of particle detection, the measured depth uncertainty is similar to previous results from stationary particles with uniform displacement. Here, the addition of relative particle motion provides further insight into experimental sources of depth uncertainty.