Nanoparticles and products incorporating nanoparticles are a growing branch of nanotechnology industry. They have
found a broad market, including the cosmetic, health care and energy sectors. Accurate and representative determination
of particle size distributions in such products is critical at all stages of the product lifecycle, extending from quality
control at point of manufacture to environmental fate at the point of disposal. Determination of particle size distributions
is non-trivial, and is complicated by the fact that different techniques measure different quantities, leading to differences
in the measured size distributions.
In this study we use both mono- and multi-modal dispersions of nanoparticle reference materials to compare and contrast
traditional and novel methods for particle size distribution determination. The methods investigated include ensemble
techniques such as dynamic light scattering (DLS) and differential centrifugal sedimentation (DCS), as well as single
particle techniques such as transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and microchannel resonator (ultra high-resolution
mass sensor).
We present a design for a switchable phase shifter that can be incorporated in a Michelson interferometer. This arrangement uses a pair of ferroelectric liquid-crystal devices with nominal retardations of a quarter wave and a switching angle of 45 deg. It produces phase shifts of 0 and ±90 deg that are almost independent of the wavelength over the range of visible wavelengths.
A low-coherence Linnik interference microscope using high numerical aperture optics has been constructed. The system uses a tungsten halogen lamp and a Koehler illumination, with separate control over field and aperture stops, so that experiments can be conducted with a range of different geometric phase which is achieved by using a polarizing beam splitter, a quarter wave plate and a rotating polarizer. Image information is extracted from the visibility of the fringes, and the position of the visibility peak along the scanning axis, yielding the height of the test surface at the corresponding points.
A white-light Linnik interference microscope using high numerical aperture optics has been constructed. The system uses a tungsten halogen source and Kohler illumination with separate control over field and aperture stops, so that experiments can be conducted with a range of different operating conditions. Infinity tube length objectives are used in the two arms. Images are recorded with a CCD camera. Different algorithms have been investigated for extraction of information from the image data. These are basd on phase stepping, which is achieved based on the principle of the geometric phase, using a polarizing beam splitter, a quarter wave plate and a rotating polarizer. Image information extracted from the visibility of the fringes and also from the phase of the interference fringes has been investigated.
Straightness measurement is a very important technique in the field of mechanical engineering. A particular application would be very high accuracy machining on a diamond turning lathe. In this paper a novel optical method for measuring straightness of motion using reflection confocal optics is proposed. The advantage of this method in comparison with the transmission optical systems used by Burch and Williams is that the lateral displacements in the direction of the two axes perpendicular to the optical axis, and the rotation angles around all three axes, can be measured simultaneously. This can be very useful for straightness measurement. Also, reflection optical systems are more compact in length.
We have developed a computer-controlled coherence probe microscope which can rapidly and accurately map the shape of micro-machined surfaces exhibiting steps and discontinuities. The instrument uses white-light and scans the object in height. The novel feature of the instrument is the use of an achromatic phase-shifter operating on the principle of geometric phase to evaluate the fringe visibility directly for each point on the object. This allows location of the position of the visibility peak along the scanning axis, yielding the height of the surface at the corresponding points.
This paper describes the application of Multiple Beam Shearing Interferometry (MBSI) to beam collimation. To realize MBSI, a plate with two optically flat surfaces, wedged slightly in thickness at an angle of 2.7 arc seconds and coated with silver is used. A high reflecting coating, in our case with 90% reflectance, is necessary to ensure that multiple beams occur resulting in sharp fringes for the transmitted light. Without the high reflecting coating the transmittance level is unsuitable for beam collimation. The small wedge angle is necessary for high accuracy. When a collimated beam is incident on the plate a sharp horizontal fringe line is observed because of the wedge in the plate. When the beam is not collimated the effect of the wedge and shear of the wavefront results in oblique fringe lines. In this paper, theoretical calculations, sensitivity of collimation and experimental results are discussed.
Polarization interferometers are widely used in microscopy. In these interferometers, the two beams traverse
almost identical paths, so that conventional phase-shifting techniques cannot be used. However, because the
two beams leaving a polarization interferometer are orthogonally polarized, it is possible to use a phase shifter
operating on the geometric phase to introduce a variable phase shift between the two beams without any change
in the optical path difference. Since this phase shift is very nearly independent of the wavelength, small variations
of the optical path difference over the field can be mapped accurately, even with white light. Achromatic phaseshifting
can also be used with two-wavelength illumination to provide a quick and simple method for profiling
surfaces exhibiting steps with heights of a few micrometres.
Scattering by rough surfaces in the Kirchhoff approximation is considered in terms of three- dimensional spatial frequencies. This has some advantages for understanding general trends of scattering behavior, and allows the inverse problems of determining profiles or their statistics from scattering measurements.
Even though interferometric profilers offer excellent axial resolution, their application is limited by ambiguities which arise if the measurement range involves a change in the optical path difference greater than a wavelength. This limitation has been overcome by using white light and scanning the object in height to locate the fringe-visibility peak. In this case, the measurement range can be increased to many wavelengths while maintaining high axial resolution. While various digital filtering techniques have been used to recover the fringe visibility curve from the sampled intensity data, they tend to be numerically intensive. The use of phase-shifting techniques to simplify the processing is complicated by the fact that the phase change introduced by changing the optical path is wavelength dependent, leading to systematic errors in the values of the fringe visibility. We show how an achromatic phase-shifter which operates on the geometric phase and generates the required phase shifts without any change in the optical path difference, can be used to evaluate the fringe visibility directly and locate the position of the fringe-visibility peak along the scanning axis.
The effects of detector size and shape in the imaging properties of confocal microscopes are discussed. The presence of stray light in the optical system, shot noise on the beam and detector performance limit the signal to noise ratio available. The effects on the noise performance of the extended-focus (mean) and autofocus (peak) algorithms for forming image projections are presented. Consideration of these various parameters allows the microscope user to obtain the best performance from his instrument for particular applications.
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