Fast Focal Point Correction in Prism-Coupled Total Internal Reflection Scanning Imager Using an Electronically Tunable Lens
Chenggang Zhu,
Bilin Ge,
Ru Chen,
Xiangdong Zhu,
Lan Mi,
Jiong Ma,
Xu Wang,
Fengyun Zheng,
Yiyan Fei
Affiliations
Chenggang Zhu
Department of Optical Science and Engineering, Shanghai Engineering Research Center of Ultra-Precision Optical Manufacturing, Key Laboratory of Micro and Nano Photonic Structures (Ministry of Education), Fudan University, Shanghai 200433, China
Bilin Ge
Department of Optical Science and Engineering, Shanghai Engineering Research Center of Ultra-Precision Optical Manufacturing, Key Laboratory of Micro and Nano Photonic Structures (Ministry of Education), Fudan University, Shanghai 200433, China
Ru Chen
Department of Optical Science and Engineering, Shanghai Engineering Research Center of Ultra-Precision Optical Manufacturing, Key Laboratory of Micro and Nano Photonic Structures (Ministry of Education), Fudan University, Shanghai 200433, China
Xiangdong Zhu
Department of Physics, University of California, Davis, CA 95616, USA
Lan Mi
Department of Optical Science and Engineering, Shanghai Engineering Research Center of Ultra-Precision Optical Manufacturing, Key Laboratory of Micro and Nano Photonic Structures (Ministry of Education), Fudan University, Shanghai 200433, China
Jiong Ma
Department of Optical Science and Engineering, Shanghai Engineering Research Center of Ultra-Precision Optical Manufacturing, Key Laboratory of Micro and Nano Photonic Structures (Ministry of Education), Fudan University, Shanghai 200433, China
Xu Wang
Department of Fundamental Courses, Wuxi Institute of Technology, Wuxi 214121, China
Fengyun Zheng
Institutes of Biomedical Science, Fudan University, Shanghai 200032, China
Yiyan Fei
Department of Optical Science and Engineering, Shanghai Engineering Research Center of Ultra-Precision Optical Manufacturing, Key Laboratory of Micro and Nano Photonic Structures (Ministry of Education), Fudan University, Shanghai 200433, China
Total internal reflection (TIR) is useful for interrogating physical and chemical processes that occur at the interface between two transparent media. Yet prism-coupled TIR imaging microscopes suffer from limited sensing areas due to the fact that the interface (the object plane) is not perpendicular to the optical axis of the microscope. In this paper, we show that an electrically tunable lens can be used to rapidly and reproducibly correct the focal length of an oblique-incidence scanning microscope (OI-RD) in a prism-coupled TIR geometry. We demonstrate the performance of such a correction by acquiring an image of a protein microarray over a scan area of 4 cm2 with an effective resolution of less than 20 microns. The electronic focal length tuning eliminates the mechanical movement of the illumination lens in the scanning microscope and in turn the noise and background drift associated with the motion.
