Trillion Frames per second Single Shot Imaging with Angular Encoding

There has been recent interest in the development of ultrafast imaging techniques that can temporally resolve transient scenes at upwards of 100 Mfps [1]. To allow the capture of events that are non-periodic or sporadic, the full scene dynamics must be captured in single measurements rather than a series of repeated measurements. Here, we present a method for acquiring a sequence of time-resolved images in a single shot, termed Single-Shot Non-Synchronous Array Photography (SNAP). In SNAP, a scene is probed by a train of femtosecond laser pulses over a range of incident angles. These angled incident pulses are then distributed onto a single camera sensor with the aid of a microlens array, producing an array of distinct images that are recorded simultaneously in a manner similar to light field imaging. In our prototype concept, SNAP will be able to acquire 25 images with a field of view of about 2mm and a framerate of 4 Tfps, providing a unique tool for the study of sub-picosecond event.

[1] Jinyang Liang and Lihong V. Wang, "Single-shot ultrafast optical imaging," Optica 5, 1113-1127 (2018)