Quantitative interferometric microscopy with improved full-field phase aberration compensation

Abstract

Single-shot quantitative interferometric microscopy (QIM) needs a high-accuracy and rapid phase retrieval algorithm. Retrieved phase distributions are often influenced by phase aberration background caused by both imaging system and phase retrieval algorithms. Here, we propose an improved phase aberration compensation (PAC) approach in order to eliminate the phase aberrations inherent in the data. With this method, sample-free parts are identified and used to calculate the background phase, reducing phase errors induced in samples and providing high-quality phase images. We now demonstrate that QIM based on this PAC approach realizes high-quality phase imaging from a single interferogram. This is of great potential for a real-time speedy diagnosis.