Not Indexed In 1948, Dennis Gabor invented holography in an attempt to obtain atomic resolution data from electron microscopy. Most standard diffraction techniques are sensitive only to the amplitude of the field.
Any information stored in the field's phase is lost.
Gabor proposed mixing the wave that has passed through a sample with a reference wave. The resulting interference pattern contains both phase and amplitude information and leads directly to the three-dimensional structure. Although optical and electron holography have now become commonplace, they have their limitations. In optical holography, the resolution is restricted by the wavelength of the light to several hundred nanometers. Lens aberrations in electron microscopes have prevented the achievement of atomic resolution in electron holography .