Technology
Since the days of Leeuwenhoek in the seventeenth century, microscopy has been two-dimensional. This may well be changed by the innovation of parallel Optical low-Coherence Tomography by Heliotis Inc. Very much like in nature the “smart pixel”-technology imitates what happens with photons in the eye: every sensor (pixel in our case) checks the incoming data and reduces it to the amount needed for generating a suitable image. The “smart pixel”-technology principally
does the same but at a very high dynamic level. The pOCT technology therefore offers a literally “smart” way of generating 3D images through microscopes, thus bringing conventional 2D microscopy to unprecedented heights.
|
The OCT principle is similar to ultrasonic imaging, but uses light instead of acoustic waves. The sample under investigation is illuminated by a low-coherence light source. The light reflected from the sample is combined with a reference signal, leading to an interferometric signal that is further processed to yield depth information. Heliotis’s new approach is based on a dedicated CMOS 2D-array sensor where every single pixel can acquire and process the optical signal in parallel (so-called “smart pixel” technology). Each pixel of the image sensor features an electronic circuit that performs real-time image pre-processing. A single sweep of the reference mirror therefore allows a scan through the complete sample and yields a full 3D tomographic or topographic image (depending on the penetration depth of the light). |
|
For details, please contact info@heliotis.ch