Quantum enhanced non-interferometric quantitative phase imaging

Quantum entanglement and squeezing have significantly improved phase estimation and imaging in interferometric settings beyond the classical limits. However, for a wide class of non-interferometric phase imaging/retrieval methods vastly used in the classical domain e.g., ptychography and diffractive imaging, a demonstration of quantum advantage is still missing. Here, we fill this gap by exploiting entanglement to enhance imaging of a pure phase object in a non-interferometric setting, only measuring the phase effect on the free-propagating field. This method, based on the so-called "transport of intensity equation", is quantitative since it provides the absolute value of the phase without prior knowledge of the object and operates in wide-field mode, so it does not need time-consuming raster scanning. Moreover, it does not require spatial and temporal coherence of the incident light. Besides a general improvement of the image quality at a fixed number of photons irradiated through the object, resulting in better discrimination of small details, we demonstrate a clear reduction of the uncertainty in the quantitative phase estimation. Although we provide an experimental demonstration of a specific scheme in the visible spectrum, this research also paves the way for applications at different wavelengths, e.g., X-ray imaging, where reducing the photon dose is of utmost importance.Comment: arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:2109.1009

A device and a method for the plenoptic reconstruction of indirect images of an object

Disclosed herein is a device (10; 20; 30; 40; 50; 60; 70; 80; 90; 100) for the plenoptic reconstruction of indirect images of an object (OBJ). Unlike prior art techniques, it is possible to overcome the problem of focusing the indirect image in the case of an object (OBJ) positioned outside a focusing plane without requiring new acquisitions of the image itself, thanks to the features of the plenoptic image acquisition device PC. Although the indirect image is visible only after the evaluation of the correlations, if such image is out of focus it is possible to perform a refocusing by using the data available in the plenoptic acquisition. Therefore, it becomes possible to reconstruct the indirect image of objects irrespective of their location, as well as of moving objects

Light Field Ghost Imaging

Techniques based on classical and quantum correlations in light beams, such as ghost imaging, allow us to overcome many limitations of conventional imaging and sensing protocols. Despite their advantages, applications of such techniques are often limited in practical scenarios where the position and the longitudinal extension of the target object are unknown. In this work, we propose and experimentally demonstrate a novel imaging technique, named Light Field Ghost Imaging, that exploits light correlations and light field imaging principles to enable going beyond the limitations of ghost imaging in a wide range of applications. Notably, our technique removes the requirement to have prior knowledge of the object distance allowing the possibility of refocusing in post-processing, as well as performing 3D imaging while retaining all the benefits of ghost imaging protocols