title: Sensitivity of synthetic aperture laser optical feedback imaging.
abstract: In this paper, we compare the sensitivity of two imaging configurations, both based on laser optical feedback imaging (LOFI). The first one is direct imaging, which uses conventional optical focalization on target, and the second one is made by a synthetic aperture (SA) laser, which uses numerical focalization. We show that SA configuration allows us to obtain good resolutions with high working distance and that the drawback of SA imagery is that it has a worse photometric balance in comparison to a conventional microscope. This drawback is partially compensated by the important sensitivity of LOFI. Another interest of SA relies on the capacity of getting three-dimensional information in a single x-y scan.
authors.affiliation: Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique/Université de Grenoble 1, Laboratoire Interdisciplinaire de Physique, UMR 5588, Grenoble, France. wilfried.glastre@ujf‑grenoble.fr
authors.forename: Wilfried
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Glastre
authors.forename: Eric
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Lacot
authors.forename: Olivier
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Jacquin
authors.forename: Olivier
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Hugon
authors.forename: Hugues Guillet
authors.initials: HG
authors.lastname: de Chatellus