utilizing intense supercontinuum light source

Combining the molecular specificity of the infrared spectral region with high resolution microscopy has been pursued by researchers for decades. Here we demonstrate infrared supercontinuum radiated from an optical fiber as a promising new light source for infrared microspectroscopy. The supercontinuum light source has a high brightness and spans the infrared region from 1400 nm to 4000 nm. This combination allows contact free high resolution hyper spectral infrared microscopy. The microscope is demonstrated by imaging an oil/water sample with 20 μm resolution. © 2012 Optical Society of America OCIS codes: (180.0180) Microscopy; (190.4370) Nonlinear optics, fibers; (320.6629) Supercontinuum generation; (110.2350) Fiber optics imaging. References and links 1. H. Humecki, Practical Applications of Infrared Microspectroscopy (Marcel Dekker, Inc., 1995). 2. J. T. Sage, Y. B. Zhang, J. McGeehan, R. B. G. Ravelli, M. Weik, and J. J. van Thor, “Infrared protein crystallography,” Biochim. 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