Polarimetric imaging beyond the speckle grain scale

Area of Science:

• Optical Physics
• Metrology
• Materials Science

Background:

• Speckle light fields possess complex polarimetric properties.
• Characterizing these properties at high spatial resolution is experimentally challenging.
• Existing methods lack the precision for sub-speckle grain analysis.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and validate an experimental Stokes imaging setup for high-resolution polarimetric analysis of speckle light fields.
• To overcome experimental challenges in measuring the state of polarization (SOP) within speckle patterns.
• To investigate the spatial evolution of SOP across speckle grains and with averaging.

Main Methods:

• Implementation of a specialized Stokes imaging setup.
• Development of a measurement protocol incorporating speckle registration.
• Validation using a metallic reference sample.
• Acquisition of highly resolved speckle patterns (>2000 pixels per grain) from various scattering samples.

Main Results:

• The setup successfully measures the SOP of light at the pixel level within high-resolution speckle patterns.
• Experimental difficulties were overcome through a dedicated protocol and speckle registration.
• The system demonstrated capability in analyzing diverse polarimetric properties of scattering samples.

Conclusions:

• The developed Stokes imaging setup and protocol enable unprecedented spatial resolution for speckle polarimetry.
• This technique provides detailed insights into the polarimetric behavior of light scattered from various materials.
• The findings pave the way for advanced optical metrology and material characterization.