Patent ID: 8677829

Claim:
A system for compactly integrating an illumination apparatus with an ultrasonic transducer assembly, the system comprising: one or more illumination apparatus for the production of lighting schemes, the one or more illumination apparatus including (i) at least one lighting source configured to provide an illumination beam, and (ii) a beamsplitting assembly that includes a sequence of one or more beamsplitters of varying transmit-reflect ratios, wherein the sequence of one or more beamsplitters is configured such that a source beam for a subsequent beamsplitter of the sequence is one of the resulting beams from a preceding beamsplitter of the sequence, wherein the illumination beam of the at least one light source is passed through the beamsplitting assembly and wherein the beamsplitting assembly divides the illumination beam of the at least one light source into one or more beams of desired intensity before passing said beams relative to a target sample; an ultrasonic transducer assembly including at least one ultrasonic transducer, wherein said ultrasonic transducer assembly detects ultrasonic waves emanating relative to the target sample; a reflective layer coupled with one or more direction-altering mirror assemblies, wherein the reflective layer is positioned directly below the ultrasonic transducer assembly, wherein the one or more direction-altering mirror assemblies are positioned (i) directly below a respective beamsplitting assembly of the one or more illumination apparatus and (ii) below the ultrasonic transducer assembly, and wherein the one or more direction-altering mirror assemblies are angled such that the one or more beams of desired intensity emanating from the respective one or more illumination apparatus are then reflected off of the reflective layer toward the area of the target sample directly under the transducer assembly; and an acoustic couplant for coupling the one or more illumination apparatus for the production of compact lighting schemes and the ultrasonic transducer assembly with the target sample.