Imagine Optic

Imagine Optic SA
Industry Wavefront sensor
Adaptive Optics
Optical metrology
Founded Orsay, France (1996)
Founder Samuel Bucourt and Xavier Levecq
Headquarters Orsay, France
Area served
 worldwide
Products Wavefront sensor, deformable mirror and adaptive optics systems
Revenue 3-4 M€
Number of employees
 20-30
Website

Imagine Optic is a French company headquartered in Orsay, a southwestern suburb of Paris. It designs and manufactures a highly accurate Shack-Hartmann wavefront sensor and adaptive optics for research and industry. The company’s primary markets include optical metrology for industrial quality control, ultra high intensity lasers and microscopy in life science.

History

Imagine Optic was founded in 1996 by Samuel Bucourt, an expert in dimensional metrology and Xavier Levecq, a specialist in wavefront measurements. Their combined expertise brings about new products that allow users to easily perform accurate wavefront measurements using Shack-Hartmann technology.

Imagine Optic also has divisions in Spain (COSINGO; since 2008), in the US (Axiom Optics; since 2010) and an office in China (since 2012).

Applications

Optical metrology

Wavefront sensors, based on the Shack-Hartman technology, have been widely used to perform highly accurate laser beam alignment, optical component characterization and optical system characterization. Wavefront sensors measure the amplitude and the phase of electromagnetic waves independently, giving intensity and wavefront profiles, respectively. The resulting absolute wavefront measurements are required in several applications, and absolute measurement accuracy is one of the key parameters for optical metrology.[1]

Recently, highly accurate wavefront sensors have been applied for the characterization of the slope error, surface roughness and surface form of large optics such as X-ray mirrors. This is an alternative measurement technique to Long Trace Profilometer (LTP).[2]

High-power lasers

Ultra high intensity lasers are now commonly used in several fields of physics research, including X-rays, wakefield acceleration, proton generation and ICF, with the common idea of intensely focusing a laser beam to energy densities that can reach 1022 W/cm2 on a target. To achieve such a goal, the laser beam typically passes through several amplification stages and is transported with larger and larger optical components. As a result, the beam is affected by thermal effects and optical aberrations which distort the wavefront and affect the focusing quality. This decreases light intensity on the target. Usually, both spectral and spatial phases are adaptively controlled in order to achieve the required focusing. Over the last 2 decades, adaptive optics for wavefront correction and beam shaping have been commonly used in laser facilities by means of a wavefront sensor that measures the spatial phase and a deformable mirror that corrects it.[3][4] Adaptive Optics systems (AOs) are now a must have in ultra-high intensity facilities, with some of the most recent systems needing several AOs to function.. Recently Imagine Optic developed mechanical actuator based deformable mirrors to specifically address the phase correction in laser systems. Key points of this technology are the optical quality, the capacity of correction, great stability and linearity and simplified maintenance requirements.

Biological imaging

Aberrations induced by optical elements of a microscope and by biological samples distort the point spread function of the optical setup and significantly reduce the quality of the acquired images. Adaptive optics can correct these aberrations and considerably improve the contrast and resolution in different types of microscopy. The benefits of the use of Imagine Optic’s products have been demonstrated in single molecule super resolution methods, such as PALM/STORM Super-resolution microscopy,[5][6] spinning disk and scanning confocal microscopy,[7] Multiphoton fluorescence microscope,[8][9] selective plane illumination microscopy (Light sheet fluorescence microscopy),[10] and structured illumination microscopy.[11]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Absolute measurement − Why is it important and how do you know if your wavefront sensor is really capable?
  2. ↑ BNL news - Inventive Thinking Leads to Improved Optical Measurements for Better X-ray Mirrors
  3. ↑ HIGH INTENSITY LASERS - Description, issues and state of-the-art
  4. ↑ Central Laser Facility - Adaptive optic developments for the Astra Gemini target area
  5. ↑ I. Izeddin, et al. “PSF shaping using adaptive optics for three-dimensional single-molecule super-resolution imaging and tracking.” (2012) Opt. Express, 20, 4957–4967
  6. ↑ K. F. Tehrani, et al. “Adaptive optics stochastic optical reconstruction microscopy (AO-STORM) using a genetic algorithm.” (2015) Opt. Express, 23, 13677-13692
  7. ↑ V. Fraisier, et al. “Adaptive optics in spinning disk microscopy : improved contrast and brightness by a simple and fast method.” (2015) J. Microsc., 259, 219-227
  8. ↑ N. Olivier, et al. “Dynamic aberration correction for multiharmonic microscopy.” (2009) Opt. Lett., 34, 3145–3147
  9. ↑ http://dx.doi.org/10.1364/BOE.2.003135 R. Aviles-Espinosa, et al. “Measurement and correction of in vivo sample aberrations employing a nonlinear guide-star in two-photon excited fluorescence microscopy.” (2011) Biomed. Opt. Express, 2, 3135+
  10. ↑ R. Jorand, et al. “Deep and clear optical imaging of thick inhomogeneous samples.” (2012) PLoS ONE, 7, e35795+
  11. ↑ B. Thomas, et al. “Enhanced resolution through thick tissue with structured illumination and adaptive optics.” (2015) J. Biomed. Opt., 20, 026006
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