3D scattering microphantom sample to assess quantitative accuracy in tomographic phase microscopy techniques

TL;DR

This paper introduces a 3D-printed microphantom to evaluate the accuracy of different tomographic phase microscopy methods, especially in multiple scattering scenarios, with potential applications in tissue imaging.

Contribution

It presents a novel 3D-printed scattering phantom for quantitative assessment of TPM methods, including those accounting for multiple scattering effects.

Findings

Comparison of three TPM methods on the phantom

Validation of methods against known geometry and refractive index

Potential extension to tissue-like scattering properties

Abstract

In this paper we present a method to robustly evaluate the quantitative accuracy of various tomographic phase microscopy (TPM) methods with a multiple scattering 3D-printed microphantom with known geometry and refractive index distribution. We demonstrate this method by fabricating a multiple-scattering phantom and comparing 3D refractive index results that are output from three TPM reconstruction methods operating with visible and near-infrared wavelengths. One of these methods assumes the sample to be weak-scattering, while the other two take multiple scattering into account. This study can be readily extended to more complex microphantoms fabricated to more closely capture scattering characteristics of real-world scattering objects, such as tissue.