Counterfactual Ghost Imaging

TL;DR

This paper introduces a counterfactual ghost imaging protocol that allows imaging objects without any photon interaction, enabling damage-free imaging of sensitive objects with improved visibility and reduced absorption.

Contribution

It extends counterfactuality to imaging, demonstrating a method that avoids photon interaction with the object while maintaining high image quality.

Findings

No photons reach the object in the infinite limit.

Significant improvement in visibility and signal-to-noise ratio.

Over tenfold reduction in absorbed intensity.

Abstract

We give a protocol for ghost imaging in a way that is always counterfactual - while imaging an object, no light interacts with that object. This extends the idea of counterfactuality beyond communication, showing how this interesting phenomenon can be leveraged for metrology. Given, in the infinite limit, no photons ever go to the imaged object, it presents a method of imaging even the most light-sensitive of objects without damaging them. Even when not in the infinite limit, it still provides a many-fold improvement in visibility and signal-to-noise ratio over previous protocols, with over an order of magnitude reduction in absorbed intensity.