Time-of-flight 3D imaging through multimode optical fibers

Science. 2021 Dec 10;374(6573):1395-1399. doi: 10.1126/science.abl3771. Epub 2021 Dec 9.

Abstract

Time-of-flight three-dimensional (3D) imaging has applications that range from industrial inspection to motion tracking. Depth is recovered by measuring the round-trip flight time of laser pulses, typically using collection optics of several centimeters in diameter. We demonstrate near–video-rate 3D imaging through multimode fibers with a total aperture of several hundred micrometers. We implement aberration correction using wavefront shaping synchronized with a pulsed source and scan the scene at ~23,000 points per second. We image moving objects several meters beyond the end of an ~40-centimeters-long fiber of 50-micrometer core diameter at frame rates of ~5 hertz. Our work grants far-field depth-resolving capabilities to ultrathin microendoscopes, which we expect to have applications to clinical and remote inspection scenarios.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't