title: Capabilities and limitations of pupil-plane filters for superresolution and image enhancement.
abstract: The use of pupil-plane filters in microscopes has been proposed as a method of producing superresolution. Here it is shown that pupil-plane filters cannot increase the support of the transfer function for a large class of optical systems, implying that resolution cannot be improved solely by adding pupil-plane filters to an instrument. However, pupil filters can improve signal-to-noise performance and modify transfer-function zero crossing positions, as demonstrated through a confocal fluorescence example.
authors.forename: Brynmor
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Davis
authors.forename: William
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Karl
authors.forename: Anna
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Swan
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Unlu
authors.forename: Bennett
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Goldberg