Apparatus and method for ranging and noise reduction of low coherence interferometry LCI and optical coherence tomography OCT signals by parallel detection of spectral bands

An apparatus for optical imaging, comprising:

• a) an interferometer structured to provide at least one signal;
• b) a spectral separating unit which splits the at least one signal received from the interferometer into a plurality of optical freguencies;
• and
• c) a plurality of detectors, each detector being configured to detect at least a portion of the optical freguencies received from the spectral separating unit, wherein the spectral separating unit comprises at least one of (i) an addressable mirror array or (ii) a waveguide filter, wherein the spectral separating unit comprises a polarization separating unit.

An apparatus for optical imaging, comprising:

• a) an interferometer structured to provide at least one signal;
• b) a spectral separating unit which splits the at least one signal received from the interferometer into a plurality of optical freguencies;
• c) a plurality of detectors, each detector being configured to detect at least a portion of the optical frequencies received from the spectral separating unit, wherein the spectral separating unit comprises at least one of (i) an addressable mirror array or (ii) a waveguide filter;
• and
• d) an arrangement which configured to at least one of:
• i. reconstruct the signal from the detectors by a mathematical manipulation of each plurality of signals obtained from the detectors, or
• ii. track a phase of the signal of the interferometer.

An apparatus for optical imaging, comprising:

• a) an interferometer structured to provide at least one signal;
• b) a spectral separating unit which splits the at least one signal received from the interferometer into a plurality of optical frequencies;
• and
• c) a plurality of detectors, each detector being configured to detect at least a portion of the optical frequencies received from the spectral separating unit, wherein the spectral separating unit comprises at least one of (i) an addressable mirror array or (ii) a waveguide filter, wherein the spectral separating unit splits the signal into a plurality of bands, whereby at least one of the bands comprises spectra that has a comb-like structure.

An apparatus for optical imaging, comprising:

• a) an interferometer structured to provide at least one signal;
• b) a spectral separating unit which splits the at least one signal received from the interferometer into a plurality of optical frequencies;
• c) a plurality of detectors, each detector being configured to detect at least a portion of the optical frequencies received from the spectral separating unit, wherein the spectral separating unit comprises at least one of (i) an addressable mirror array or (ii) a waveguide filter;
• and
• d) an arrangement which configured to track a phase of the at least one signal of the interferometer.

An apparatus for optical imaging, comprising:

• a) an interferometer structured to receive at least one electro-magnetic radiation from a reference and provide at least one signal;
• b) a spectral separating unit which splits the at least one signal received from the interferometer into a plurality of optical frequencies;
• and
• c) a plurality of detectors, each detector being configured to detect at least a portion of the optical frequencies received from the spectral separating unit, wherein the spectral separating unit comprises at least one of (i) an addressable mirror array or (ii) a waveguide filter.