Aberration-free volumetric high-speed imaging of in vivo retina

Certain topics in research and advancements in medical diagnostics may benefit from improved temporal and spatial resolution during non-invasive optical imaging of living tissue. However, so far no imaging technique can generate entirely diffraction-limited tomographic volumes with a single data acquisition, if the target moves or changes rapidly, such as the human retina. Additionally, the presence of aberrations may represent further difficulties. We show that a simple interferometric setup-based on parallelized optical coherence tomography-acquires volumetric data with 10 billion voxels per second, exceeding previous imaging speeds by an order of magnitude. This allows us to computationally obtain and correct defocus and aberrations resulting in entirely diffraction-limited volumes. As demonstration, we imaged living human retina with clearly visible nerve fiber layer, small capillary networks, and photoreceptor cells. Furthermore, the technique can also obtain phase-sensitive volumes of other scattering structures at unprecedented acquisition speeds.

• Hillmann, D.
• Spahr, H.
• Hain, C.
• Sudkamp, H.
• Franke, G.
• Pfaffle, C.
• Winter, C.
• Huttmann, G.