Wide-field high-speed space-division multiplexing optical coherence tomography using an integrated photonic device

Space-division multiplexing optical coherence tomography (SDM-OCT) is a recently developed parallel OCT imaging method in order to achieve multi-fold speed improvement. However, the assembly of fiber optics components used in the first prototype system was labor-intensive and susceptible to errors. Here, we demonstrate a high-speed SDM-OCT system using an integrated photonic chip that can be reliably manufactured with high precisions and low per-unit cost. A three-layer cascade of 1 x 2 splitters was integrated in the photonic chip to split the incident light into 8 parallel imaging channels with similar to 3.7 mm optical delay in air between each channel. High-speed imaging (similar to 1s/volume) of porcine eyes ex vivo and wide-field imaging (similar to 18.0 x 14.3 mm(2)) of human fingers in vivo were demonstrated with the chip-based SDM-OCT system. (C) 2017 Optical Society of America