High-resolution microscopy with low-resolution objectives: correcting phase aberrations in Fourier ptychography

Abstract

The spatial resolution of a microscope is inversely proportionate to the sum of the objective numerical aperture (NA) and the illumination NA. Fourier Ptychography (FP) microscopy achieves high-resolution, wide-field imaging by the use of a low-NA, wide-field objective combined with time-sequential synthesis of high NA illumination using an array of LEDs. We describe reconstruction algorithms based on Fresnel propagation, rather than the traditional Fraunhofer propagation, which enables more accurate representation of LED illumination and hence reduced aberration in the image reconstruction. This also enables the new technique of Multi-Aperture Fourier Ptychography in the near-field. In this work the implementation of this algorithm is described together with some experimental results. The performance of this algorithm is validated by comparing to Fraunhofer based algorithm. More sophisticated update functions in the reconstruction procedures developed for FP are implemented with this algorithm and their performance is validated. The pupil phase can also be reconstructed during the reconstruction procedure hence allowing us to correct for the aberrations in the optical system without the need of any additional measurements.