Effects of source coherence on low coherence interferometric imaging

Author

Piao, Daqing ; Zhu, Quing ; Dutta, Niloy ; Yan, Shikui ; Otis, Linda

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. & Syst. Eng., Connecticut Univ., Storrs, CT, USA

fYear

2000

fDate

2000

Firstpage

91

Lastpage

92

Abstract

Optical coherence tomography (OCT) is an important imaging technique for medical applications. In this work we report our results on imaging of periodontal tissue. Our OCT system utilizes an erbium doped fiber amplifier emitting near 1.55 μm as the source. The coherence length of the source can be varied by more than a factor of 5 by varying the current of the pump laser used in the amplifier. This allows an easy adjustment and a trade-off study of depth of penetration and resolution. The output power of the source can also be varied to allow high penetration depth. Measurement and analysis of the signal to noise of our system and images of periodontal tissue are presented

Keywords

dentistry; image resolution; laser applications in medicine; light coherence; light interferometry; optical tomography; 1.55 micron; Michelson interferometer; OCT; erbium doped fiber amplifier; high penetration depth; low coherence interferometric imaging; periodontal tissue imaging; resolution; signal to noise ratio; source coherence effects; Biomedical equipment; Biomedical optical imaging; Doped fiber amplifiers; Erbium; Medical services; Optical imaging; Optical interferometry; Optical pumping; Stimulated emission; Tomography;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Bioengineering Conference, 2000. Proceedings of the IEEE 26th Annual Northeast

Conference_Location

Storrs, CT

Print_ISBN

0-7803-6341-8

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/NEBC.2000.842394

Filename

842394