Dispersion Encoded Full Range Optical Coherence Tomograph

摘要

An apparatus for optical coherence tomography comprises: a light source (210); a first arm including a first dispersive optical assembly (220, 234, 230) inducing a first amount of dispersion into light coming from the light source and traversing the first arm, the first arm configuring one of a sample arm and a reference arm of an interferometer; a second arm including a second dispersive optical assembly (220, 244, 246, 248; 520) inducing a second amount of dispersion into light coming from the light source and traversing the second arm, the second arm configuring the other of the sample arm and reference arm, the second amount of dispersion being larger than the first amount of dispersion; a processing unit (262) configured to process an interferometry signal to perform Dispersion Encoded Full Range optical coherence tomography, the interferometry signal representative of a superposition of the light from the first arm and the light from the second arm, wherein for any sub-assembly of one or more optical elements of the second dispersive optical assembly an amount of dispersion induced by the sub-assembly into the light traversing the second arm is different from the first amount of dispersion.