A Hyperspectral Microscope based on an Ultrastable Common-Path Interferometer

TL;DR

This paper presents a hyperspectral microscope based on a stable, common-path interferometer that enables fast, high-quality spectral imaging suitable for biological and material science applications.

Contribution

It introduces a novel hyperspectral microscopy system using a compact, stable interferometer with multiple implementations and a new spectral acquisition method.

Findings

Achieved 1 million pixel hyperspectral imaging in 75 seconds.

Demonstrated high-quality spectral imaging of stained cells and inorganic powders.

System is suitable for biological and materials science applications.

Abstract

We introduce a wide field hyperspectral microscope using the Fourier-transform approach. The interferometer is based on the Translating-Wedge-Based Identical Pulses eNcoding System (TWINS) [Opt. Lett. 37, 3027 (2012)], a common-path birefringent interferometer which combines compactness, intrinsic interferometric delay precision, long-term stability and insensitivity to vibrations. We describe three different implementations of our system: two prototypes designed to test different optical schemes and an add-on for a commercial microscope. We show high-quality spectral microscopy of the fluorescence from stained cells and powders of inorganic pigments, demonstrating that the device is suited to biology and materials science. We demonstrate the acquisition of a 1Mpixel hyperspectral image in 75 seconds in the spectral range from 400 to 1100 nm. We also introduce an acquisition method which synthesizes a tunable spectral filter, providing band-passed images by the measurement of only two maps.