Wide-field Super-resolution Imaging With Femtosecond Time Resolution

SUMMARY

• Optical imaging techniques are limited by diffraction or acquisition time, making imaging through solid materials at the molecular level particularly challenging. As such, current spectroscopy approaches are significantly limited in the resolution of the images captured.
• The inventors developed a novel optical resonance imaging technique that uses two laser pulses to excite the subject, and a third laser pulse stimulates optical emission. Tilting the third pulse creates time delays between the top and bottom of the pulse, resulting in the pulse interacting with different lateral spatial locations of the sample at different times. This in turn allows the mapping of the signal origin to a location on the sample.
• The invention is a system that is analogous to an MRI-device that can map the position of molecules within a given material. 
• The inventors constructed a prototype device and use theoretical modeling to prove that super-resolution imaging is possible with the device. The expected resolution of the prototype is up to 5um.

FIGURE

(A) Schematic diagram of the three-pulse imaging sequence. Pulses 1 and 2 put the sample in an excited state while pulse 3 stimulates emission of a photon echo signal (shown in green). (B) Schematic of the image taken using the invention method (red) as compared to an image taken using a traditional diffraction-limited image (grey). 

ADVANTAGES

ADVANTAGES

• Overcomes optical diffraction limits with high temporal resolution
• Allows observation of femtosecond dynamical processes
• Provides the opportunity to visualize carrier transport
• Produces inherently wide-field images for rapid data acquisition
• Generates spectrally-resolved images
• Provides both amplitude and phase contrast via heterodyne detection
• Can be implemented to be background free

APPLICATIONS

• Organic and inorganic optoelectronics and photovoltaics
• Improved graphene-based electronics
• Optical pathology
• Improved carbon nanotubes
• Novel high speed, high voltage devices
• Other analytical chemistry applications 

PUBLICATIONS

• Allodi, M; et al. Optical resonance imaging: an optical analog to MRI with sub-diffraction-limited capabilities. ACS Photonics. 2016 Dec 21;3(12):2445-2452.

August 5, 2019

Prototype

Patent Pending

Licensing,Co-development

Gregory Engel

• US: 16/181,738