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AssigneeOptical Coherence Technologies, Inc.
InventorsValentin M. Gelikonov, Grigory V. Gelikonov, Natalia D. Gladkova, Vladimir I. Leonov, Felix I. Feldchtein, Alexander M. Sergeev, Yakov I. Khanin
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The invention is related to technical physics, in particular to devices for investigating the internal structure of objects and can be used in medicine for diagnostics of human organs and systems, in particular for optical coherence tomography and in technical diagnostics, for example technological process control. The invention relates to the creation of an optical-fiber interferometer, which, being used in a device for optical coherence tomography, allows one to investigate media with short time of changing of optical characteristics or its position relative to the optical probe, for example biotissues in vivo. The invention also relates to the creation of a piezoelectric modulator, suitable for use in the interferometer and for providing the necessary scanning depth in the mentioned media. In the described optical fiber interferometer the piezoelectric modulator, constructed as a fiber optic piezoelectric controllable delay line, performs a function of the fiber part of the interferometer arm which allows one to change practically inertialess the optical path in the interferometer arm and consequently an optical path difference at least to several tens of the working wavelenghts.
An optical fiber interferometer comprising a coupler optically connected with a sampling arm and a reference arm, each of said arms including an optical fiber part, one of said arms comprising a first optical fiber piezoelectric transducer, said sampling arm having an optical probe, said first transducer comprising at least one body (a) having piezoelectric properties and (b) exhibiting a perpendicular inverse piezoeffect, said first transducer having electrodes, said first transducer having an electric field vector when an electric field is applied to said electrodes, said body having a thickness in a direction substantially aligned with said electric field vector and having a width in a direction substantially perpendicular to said electric field vector, said thickness being substantially smaller than said width, an optical fiber being mechanically connected with said body effective to allow changing of the optical length of the interferometer arm comprising said first transducer by at least several tens of operating wavelengths of the interferometer, said first transducer serving as a scanning element, wherein said first optical fiber piezoelectric transducer comprises a piezoelectric plate with electrodes located on first and second opposite surfaces of said plate, a first optical fiber part of said interferometer arm comprising said first transducer being mechanically connected to said first surface of said piezoelectric plate so that the optical length of said arm comprising said first transducer can be varied.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.