Holographic deconvolution microscopy for high-resolution particle tracking

Rayleigh-Sommerfeld back-propagation can be used to reconstruct the three-dimensional light field responsible for the recorded intensity in an in-line hologram. Deconvolving the volumetric reconstruction with an optimal kernel derived from the Rayleigh-Sommerfeld propagator itself emphasizes the objects responsible for the scattering pattern while suppressing both the propagating light and also such artifacts as the twin image. Bright features in the deconvolved volume may be identified with such objects as colloidal spheres and nanorods. Tracking their thermally-driven Brownian motion through multiple holographic video images provides estimates of the tracking resolution, which approaches 1 nm in all three dimensions. (C) 2011 Optical Society of America