Towards ideal focusing of diffused light via optical wavefront shaping

Abstract

Controllable optical propagation, such as forming diffraction-limited optical focusing, beyond the diffusion limit in biological tissue or tissue-like scattering media, has been desired for long yet considered challenging. In the past two decades, optical wavefront shaping (WFS) has been proposed and has progressed, demonstrating its remarkable potential. That said, inherent tradeoffs still exist among optimization speed, control degree of freedom, and energy gain, which has hindered wide applications of the technology. Most recently, an analogue optical phase conjugation system was developed, equipped with stimulated emission light amplification that effectively achieves the least tradeoff ever, yielding high-gain and high-speed performance of optical focusing through dynamic thick media.