Digital holographic microscopy as a tool to study the thermal shape fluctuations of lipid vesicles

Wavelength-multiplexing surface plasmon holographic microscopy

Surface plasmon holographic microscopy (SPHM), which combines surface plasmon microscopy with digital holographic microscopy, can be applied for amplitude- and phase-contrast surface plasmon resonance (SPR) imaging. In this paper, we propose an improved SPHM with the wavelength multiplexing technique based on two laser sources and a common-path hologram recording configuration. Through recording and reconstructing the SPR images at two wavelengths simultaneously employing the improved SPHM, tiny variation of dielectric refractive index in near field is quantitatively monitored with an extended measurement range while maintaining the high sensitivity. Moreover, imaging onion tissues is performed to demonstrate that the detection sensitivities of two wavelengths can compensate for each other in SPR imaging. The proposed wavelength-multiplexing SPHM presents simple structure, high temporal stability and inherent capability of phase curvature compensation, as well as shows great potentials for further applications in monitoring diverse dynamic processes related with refractive index variations and imaging biological tissues with low-contrast refractive index distributions in the near field.

Compact and stable real-time dual-wavelength digital holographic microscopy with a long-working distance objective

We propose a compact dual wavelength digital holographic Microscopy (DHM) based on a long working distance objective, which enabling quantitative phase imaging of opaque samples with extended measurement range in one shot. The compactness of the configuration is achieved by constructing a miniature modified Michelson interferometer between the objective and the sample, and as a result it provides higher temporal stability than conventional dual wavelength DHM. In the setup, the propagation directions of two reference beams of different wavelengths can be independently adjusted, and thus two off axis interferograms having orthogonal fringe directions can be simultaneously captured through a monochrome CCD camera. The unambiguous vertical measurement range in optical path length is extended to 8.338 μm, the length of a synthetic wavelength, by selecting two wavelengths with a gap of 52 nm. The capability of the proposed setup is demonstrated with measurements of a standard 1.8 μm height step as well as a moving micro staircase structure.

Theory and algorithms to compute Helfrich bending forces: a review

Cell membranes are vital to shield a cell's interior from the environment. At the same time they determine to a large extent the cell's mechanical resistance to external forces. In recent years there has been considerable interest in the accurate computational modeling of such membranes, driven mainly by the amazing variety of shapes that red blood cells and model systems such as vesicles can assume in external flows. Given that the typical height of a membrane is only a few nanometers while the surface of the cell extends over many micrometers, physical modeling approaches mostly consider the interface as a two-dimensional elastic continuum. Here we review recent modeling efforts focusing on one of the computationally most intricate components, namely the membrane's bending resistance. We start with a short background on the most widely used bending model due to Helfrich. While the Helfrich bending energy by itself is an extremely simple model equation, the computation of the resulting forces is far from trivial. At the heart of these difficulties lies the fact that the forces involve second order derivatives of the local surface curvature which by itself is the second derivative of the membrane geometry. We systematically derive and compare the different routes to obtain bending forces from the Helfrich energy, namely the variational approach and the thin-shell theory. While both routes lead to mathematically identical expressions, so-called linear bending models are shown to reproduce only the leading order term while higher orders differ. The main part of the review contains a description of various computational strategies which we classify into three categories: the force, the strong and the weak formulation. We finally give some examples for the application of these strategies in actual simulations.

Transmission and total internal reflection integrated digital holographic microscopy

We develop a transmission and total internal reflection (TIR) integrated digital holographic microscopy (DHM) by introducing a home-made Dove prism with a polished short side. With the help of angular and polarization multiplexing techniques, the 2D refractive index distribution of a specimen adhered on the prism surface is determined using TIR-DHM. Meanwhile, the thickness profile is unambiguously calculated from the phase information using transmission DHM. This integrated microscopy is nondestructive and dynamic and can be used to simultaneously measure the index distribution and thickness profile of transparent or semi-transparent liquid or solid samples.