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Technology

Ultrafast imaging takes on a new design

Nature volume 516, pages 46–47 (2014)Cite this article

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An imaging technique has been developed that can record non-repetitive ultrafast phenomena without strobe or flash illumination. The approach could find applications in biomedicine and security technologies. See Letter p.74

In this issue, Gao and colleagues1 (page 74) describe a new imaging technology that can capture time-evolving events at a speed of up to 100 billion frames per second without the need for specialized illumination methods. The technique involves a unique hardware design combined with spatial encoding of the image, to achieve something not possible before. The approach allows imaging of ultrafast phenomena that need happen only once, and does so using single camera snapshots. By contrast, ultrafast imaging techniques used today rely on imaging the same subject over and over again, requiring it to be a repeated event, or on using strobe or flash illumination.

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Figure 1: Fast cameras over time.

References

  1. Gao, L., Liang, J., Li, C. & Wang, L. V. Nature 516, 74–77 (2014).

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  1. Brian W. Pogue is in the Thayer School of Engineering, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire 03755, USA.,

    Brian W. Pogue

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  1. Brian W. Pogue
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Correspondence to Brian W. Pogue.

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Pogue, B. Ultrafast imaging takes on a new design. Nature 516, 46–47 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/516046a

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