Optogenetic approaches allow the activation or inhibition of genetically prescribed populations of neurons by light. In principle, optogenetics offers not only the ability to elucidate the functions of neural circuitry, but also new approaches to a treatment of neurodegenerative diseases and recovery of vision and auditory perception. Optogenetics already has revolutionized research in neuroscience. However, new methods for delivering light to three-dimensionally distributed structures e.g. in the brain are necessary. A major hurdle for focusing light through biological tissue is the occurring scattering and scrambling of the light. We demonstrate the correction of the scrambling in a multimode fiber by digital optical phase conjugation with a perspective for ptogenetics.

The full complex, spatial modulation of light at high frame rates is essential for a variety of applications. In particular, emerging techniques applied to scattering media, such as Digital Optical Phase Conjugation and Wavefront Shaping, request challenging performance parameters. They refer to imaging tasks inside biological media, whose characteristics concerning the transmission and reflection of scattered light may change over time within milliseconds. Thus, these methods call for frame rates in the kilohertz range. Existing solutions typically offer frame rate capabilities below 100 Hz, since they rely on liquid crystal spatial light modulators (SLMs). We propose a diffractive MEMS optical system for this application range. It relies on an analog, tilt-type micro mirror array (MMA) based on an established SLM technology, where the standard application is grayscale amplitude control. The new MMA system design allows the phase manipulation at high-speed as well. The article studies properties of the appropriate optical setup by simulating the propagation of the light. Relevant test patterns and sensitivity parameters of the system will be analyzed. Our results illustrate the main opportunities of the concept with particular focus on the tilt mirror technology. They indicate a promising path to realize the complex light modulation at frame rates above 1 kHz and resolutions well beyond 10,000 complex pixels.

The availability of spatial light modulators as standard turnkey components and their ongoing development makes them attractive for a huge variety of optical measurement systems in industry and research. Here, we outline two examples of how optical measurements can benefit from spatial light modulators. Ultrasound testing has become an indispensable tool for industrial inspection. Contact-free measurements can be achieved by laser-induced ultrasound. One disadvantage is that due to the highly divergent sound field of the generated shear waves for a point-wise thermoelastic excitation, only a poor spatial selectivity can be achieved. This problem can be solved by creating an ultrasound focus by means of a ring-like laser intensity distribution, but standard fixed-form optical components used for their generation are always optimised to a fixed set of parameters. Here, we demonstrate, how a predefined intensity pattern as e.g. a ring can be created from an arbitrary input laser beam using a phase-retrieval algorithm to shape an ultrasound focus in the sample. By displaying different patterns on the spatial light modulator, the focus can be traversed in all three directions through the object allowing a fast and highly spatially resolving scanning of the sample. Optical measurements take often place under difficult conditions. They are affected by variations of the refractive index, caused e.g. by phase boundaries between two media of different optical density. This will result in an increased measurement uncertainty or, in the worst case, will cause the measurement to fail. To overcome these limitations, we propose the application of adaptive optics. Optical flow velocity measurements based on image correlation in water that are performed through optical distortions are discussed. We demonstrate how the measurement error induced by refractive index variations can be reduced if a spatial light modulator is used in the measurement setup to compensate for the wavefront distortions.

Die vorliegende Arbeit beschäftigt sich mit dem Konzept der radial nicht-oszillierenden, zeitlich stabilen ultrakurzen Bessel ähnlichen Strahlen oder "Nadelstrahlen" ("needle beams"), die zu einer Klasse von optischen hochlokalisierten Wellenpaketen generalisiert werden. Hierbei wird die Theorie über das räumlich-zeitlichen Ausbreitungsverhaltens von nicht auseinanderdriftenden Nadelstrahlen mit Pulsdauern von kleiner als 10 fs näher diskutiert. Dies wird durch eine systematische Darstellung der Methoden zur Generierung und Detektierung von lokalisierten Wellen komplettiert, die ein optischen Drehmoment tragen. Für die Erzeugung von HLWs kommen räumliche Lichtmodulatoren zum Einsatz, die ein flexibles Zuschneiden von Wellenpaketen mit der Dauer weniger Zyklen des EM-Feldes erlauben. Es wird gezeigt, dass solche optischen Pulse sich über beträchtliche Entfernungen ausbreiten, ohne dass sich dabei signifikant der Strahldurchmesser vergrößert oder der Puls zeitlich verbreitert. In variabler Weise werden verschiedene geometrische (z.B. ringförmige) Lichtverteilungen erzeugt. Anwendungspotential findet sich insbesondere in den Techniken der räumlichen Pulsformung und Diagnostik. Als besonders wichtiger Ansatz ist der Zeit-Wellenfront-Sensor zu erwähnen, welcher die nichtlineare, mehrkanalige Autokorrelation, die Wellenfrontdetektion mittels nichtdiffraktiver Teilstrahlen nach dem Shack-Hartmann-Prinzip und eine adaptive Funktionalität miteinander vorteilhaft verbindet. Das enorme Potential solcher Ansätze wird durch die hohe Genauigkeit orts-, winkel- und zeitabhängiger Rekonstruktionen der Wellenpakete nachgewiesen. Darüber hinaus ermöglicht das räumliche Kodieren und anschließende Verfolgen der Teilstrahlen eine wesentliche Verbesserung der Identifikation relevanter Parameter von Verteilungsfunktionen. Schließlich werden erste Schritte zur experimentellen Generation von optischen "light bullets" mit ganzzahligen und fraktalen orbitalen Drehmomenten präsentiert. / This thesis deals with the concept of radially non-oscillating, temporally stable ultrashort-pulsed Bessel-like beams or "needle pulses", which are an example of a highly localized wave packet (HLW). HLWs are the closest approximation of linear-optical light bullets and provide specific benefits compared to conventional Gaussian-like light bullets. The spatio-temporally nonspreading propagation behavior of few-cycle needle beams of less than 10 fs duration will be theoretically discussed in detail. An overview of the generation and detection of localized waves carrying an orbital angular momentum is also given. High fidelity spatial light modulators are used for the generation of HLWs. The flexible tailoring of few-cycle wave packets at near-infrared wavelengths is reported. It is shown that such pulses propagate over a huge depth of focus, neither significantly changing their spot size or nor the pulse duration. Variable geometrical distributions like circular disks, rings, or bars of light are shaped and exploited as building blocks for structures of higher complexity. Another section of the thesis emphasizes the numerous potential applications of related techniques for an optimized two-dimensional spatial pulse shaping and diagnostics (reduce ambiguities) based on localized waves. As a particularly important example, time-wavefront sensing is used to combine nonlinear multichannel autocorrelation with Shack-Hartmann wavefront sensing by means of localized sub-beams and adaptive functionality. The capabilities of such devices are illustrated by the results of angular and temporal mapping of few-cycle wave packets. Moreover, spatial encoding and subsequent tracking of individual sub-beams, even at incident angles of up to 50°, enables to significantly improve the spot recognition. Finally, first steps towards the generation of optical light bullets carrying integer or non-integer orbital angular momenta are presented.