Gigahertz time-domain spectroscopy and imaging for non-destructive materials research and evaluation

By using optical sampling with repetition frequency modulation of pump/probe laser pulses on photoconductive emitter/detector antennas, the high-speed time/frequency domain gigahertz imaging is reported due to the absence of opto-mechanical delay line in this optical scheme. The clear contrast for a 3-cm wide metal plate, which was placed behind a 5-cm thick concrete block, was observed with a 1 × 1 mm image pixilation. On average, it took only ~0.75 s per pixel/waveform acquisition/assignment with a 675 ps time-domain window. This could become a valuable non-destructive evaluation technique in gigahertz spectral range with all benefits of time-domain spectroscopy.