TITLE:
Numerical Simulation of Super-Resolution Structured Illumination Microscopy (SIM) Using Heintzmann-Cremer Algorithm with Non-Continuous Spatial Frequency Support
AUTHORS:
Mesfin Woldeyohannes, William McCray, Weiguo Yang
KEYWORDS:
Structured Illumination Microscopy, Super Resolution Imaging, Spatial Frequency Support, Diffraction Limit
JOURNAL NAME:
Optics and Photonics Journal,
Vol.14 No.5,
May
31,
2024
ABSTRACT: We report a comprehensive numerical study of super resolution (SR) structured illumination microscopy (SIM) utilizing the classic Heintzmann-Cremer SIM process and algorithm. In particular, we investigated the impact of the diffraction limit of the underlying imaging system on the optimal SIM grating frequency that can be used to obtain the highest SR enhancement with non-continuous spatial frequency support. Besides confirming the previous theoretical and experimental work that SR-SIM can achieve an enhancement close to 3 times the diffraction limit with grating pattern illuminations, we also observe and report a series of more subtle effects of SR-SIM with non-continuous spatial frequency support. Our simulations show that when the SIM grating frequency exceeds twice that of the diffraction limit, the higher SIM grating frequency can help achieve a higher SR enhancement for the underlying imaging systems whose diffraction limit is low, though this enhancement is obtained at the cost of losing resolution at some lower resolution targets. Our simulations also show that, for underlying imaging systems with high diffraction limits, however, SR-SIM grating frequencies above twice the diffraction limits tend to bring no significant extra enhancement. Furthermore, we observed that there exists a limit grating frequency above which the SR enhancement effect is lost, and the reconstructed images essentially have the same resolution as the one obtained directly from the underlying imaging system without using the SIM process.