Date
2016
Abstract
The spatial resolution in far-field mid-infrared (λ>2.5 μm) microscopy and microspectroscopy remains limited with the full-width at half maximum of the point-spread function ca. λ/1.3; a value that is very poor in comparison to that commonly accessible with visible and near-infrared optics. Hereafter, it is demonstrated however that polymer beads that are centre-to-centre spaced by λ/2.6 can be resolved in the mid-infrared. The more than 2-fold improvement in resolution in the far-field is achieved by exploiting a newly constructed scanning microscope built around a mid-infrared optical parametric oscillator and a central solid-immersion lens, and by enforcing the linear polarization unidirectional resolution enhancement with a novel and robust specimen error minimization based on a particle swarm optimization. The method is demonstrated with specimens immersed in air and in water, and its robustness shown by the analysis of dense and complex self-assembled bead islands.
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Description
peer-reviewed
Publisher
Optical Society of America
Citation
Optics Express;24 (21), pp. 24377-24389
Collections
Physics
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Silien_2017_doubling.pdf
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Keywords
instrumentation, measurement, metrology
ULRR Identifiers
https://hdl.handle.net/10344/6285
 https://doi.org/10.34961/10076
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Funding Information
European Research Council (ERC), Science Foundation Ireland (SFI), Irish Research Council (IRC)
Sustainable Development Goals
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