Optimization of pupil design for point-scanning and line-scanning confocal microscopy

Both point-scanning and line-scanning confocal microscopes provide resolution and optical sectioning to observe nuclear and cellular detail in human tissues, and are being translated for clinical applications. While traditional point-scanning is truly confocal and offers the best possible optical sectioning and resolution, line-scanning is partially confocal but may offer a relatively simpler and lower-cost alternative for more widespread dissemination into clinical settings. The loss of sectioning and loss of contrast due to scattering in tissue is more rapid and more severe with a line-scan than with a point-scan. However, the sectioning and contrast may be recovered with the use of a divided-pupil. Thus, as part of our efforts to translate confocal microscopy for detection of skin cancer, and to determine the best possible approach for clinical applications, we are now developing a quantitative understanding of imaging performance for a set of scanning and pupil conditions. We report a Fourier-analysis-based computational model of confocal microscopy for six configurations. The six configurations are point-scanning and line-scanning, with full-pupil, half-pupil and divided-pupils. The performance, in terms of on-axis irradiance (signal), resolution and sectioning capabilities, is quantified and compared among these six configurations.