Grating Light Valve Based Optical Coherence Tomography

[0013]The present invention proposes an interferometric system for optical imaging. In particular, the invention is an integrated system for detection, ranging, metrology and multi-dimensional imaging.

[0014]In U.S. Pat. No. 7,079,256 B2, the Mach-Zehnder interferometer (MZI) is built using bulk optical elements and uses time-domain form of optical coherence-tomography. FIG. 1 illustrates an optical diagram of a Mach-Zehnder Interferometric optical coherence tomography system (100) as described in the prior art. In the system source 102 emits a beam of light. The light can optionally be broadband light. The beam splits at the first beam splitter (116) (typically 99% Transmittance and 1% Reflectance) getting divided into two separate light beams known as reference arm or reference path (122) and sample arm or sample path (120). The reference arm beam (122) is reflected by a scanning minor 118 towards a second beam splitter (114) (typically 99% Transmittance and 1% Reflectance). The be...