Abstract

Spatial light interference microscopy (SLIM) is a white light quantitative phase imaging method, capable of measuring optical path-length changes of 0.3 nm spatially (i.e. point to point change) and 0.03 nm temporally (i.e. frame to frame change). The resulting topographic accuracy is comparable to that of atomic force microscopy, while the acquisition speed is 1,000 times higher. Due to the micron-scale coherence length of the illuminating field, SLIM provides high axial resolution optical sectioning. Using a 3D complex field deconvolution, we render tomographic refractive index distributions of live, unstained cells. Owing to its low noise and temporal stability, SLIM enables nanometre-scale cell dynamics.

© 2011 Optical Society of America