Patent ID: 8947648
Filing Date: 2015-02-03
Classification: G01B

Abstract:
1. An imaging system, comprising: an electro-magnetic radiation source configured to provide a first electro-magnetic radiation to a sample and a second electro-magnetic radiation to a reference, wherein a frequency of radiation provided by the electro-magnetic radiation source varies over time; a detector/interferogram unit configured to detect an interference between a third radiation associated with the first radiation and a fourth radiation associated with the second radiation and generate at least one interferogram associated with the third electro-magnetic radiation and the fourth electro-magnetic radiation; and a signal processing unit configured to extract hybrid data from the at least one interferogram and produce an image of the sample based on the hybrid data, wherein the hybrid data includes at least one of magnitude data, phase data, and polarization data, wherein said signal processing unit is further configured to improve the quality of the image based on the hybrid data by adjusting one or more variables used to produce the image, wherein the quality of the image is improved by at least one of reducing artifacts, eliminating the complex conjugate ambiguity, reducing polarization fading, increasing system sensitivity, improving axial resolution, and compensating for at least one of system imperfections, detector/interferogram unit imperfections, non-linearities present in the electro-magnetic radiation source, chromatic dispersion, polarization rotation, compensating for polarization dependent loss, polarization mode dispersion, wavelength dependence of at least one optical component of the system, electro-magnetic radiation source nonlinearities, imperfections in a polarization splitting ratio, imperfections in wavelength-dependent polarization mode dispersion, imperfections in wavelength-dependent polarization dependent loss, imperfections in wavelength-dependent phase deviations, and imperfections in polarization-dependent phase deviation, wherein the compensating for non-linearities present in the electro-magnetic radiation source is performed in real time.