Patent ID: 8730573

Claim:
A method of forming an image of a sample, the method comprising: focusing a beam of excitation light to a focal spot within the sample, a cross-section of the beam including individual beamlets; scanning the focal spot to different positions within the sample; individually controlling angles of the individual beamlets when the focal spot is at the different positions, wherein individually controlling angles of the individual beamlets includes: modulating the excitation beam with a wavefront modulating element that includes individual subregions that correspond to the individual beamlets; and within each individual subregion, controlling profiles of phase values imparted by the subregion to the corresponding beamlet to induce a spatial gradient in the phase of the corresponding individual beamlet; individually controlling relative phases of the individual beamlets when the focal spot is at the different positions, such that the individual beamlets interfere constructively with each other within the focal spot; detecting emission light emitted from the focal spot when the focal spot is at the different positions; and generating an image of the sample based on the detected emission light from the different positions of the focal spot.