Spectral binning for mitigation of polarization mode dispersion artifacts in catheter-based optical frequency domain imaging

• Published in: Optics express Vol. 21; no. 14; pp. 16353 - 16369
• Main Authors: Villiger, Martin, Zhang, Ellen Ziyi, Nadkarni, Seemantini K, Oh, Wang-Yuhl, Vakoc, Benjamin J, Bouma, Brett E
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Optical Society of America 15.07.2013
• Subjects: Algorithms; Carotid Arteries - anatomy & histology; Carotid Arteries - physiology; Catheterization - methods; Humans; Image Enhancement - methods; Image Interpretation, Computer-Assisted - methods; Reproducibility of Results; Sensitivity and Specificity; Tomography, Optical Coherence - methods
• ISSN: 1094-4087; 1094-4087
• DOI: 10.1364/oe.21.016353

Polarization mode dispersion (PMD) has been recognized as a significant barrier to sensitive and reproducible birefringence measurements with fiber-based, polarization-sensitive optical coherence tomography systems. Here, we present a signal processing strategy that reconstructs the local retardation robustly in the presence of system PMD. The algorithm uses a spectral binning approach to limit the detrimental impact of system PMD and benefits from the final averaging of the PMD-corrected retardation vectors of the spectral bins. The algorithm was validated with numerical simulations and experimental measurements of a rubber phantom. When applied to the imaging of human cadaveric coronary arteries, the algorithm was found to yield a substantial improvement in the reconstructed birefringence maps.