Optical Imaging and Metrology: Advanced Technologies

Book Preface

This book contains all contributions which were presented on occasion of the last HoloMet workshop ‘‘HoloMet 2010’’ in Balatonf¨ured, Hungary. The year of HoloMet 2010 closed the first decade of the 21st century. During this period many key technologies such as micro electronics, photonics, informatics, and mechatronics have shown an extremely fast development that perhaps was never seen before. Moreover, in 2010 we celebrated the 50th anniversary of the birth of the laser and the 45th anniversary of the invention of holographic interferometry. And even more, in June 2010 the inventor of holography, Dennis Gabor, had his 110th birthday. Thus it was a welcome opportunity to come together again and to discuss the state of the art, modern trends, and future perspectives in optics. Obviously, optical sciences have experienced dramatic transformations within the last few decades, influenced by revolutionary inventions of many branches such as image processing, digital holography, plasmonics, photonic sources and sensors from which optical imaging and metrology have benefited remarkably.

The HoloMet workshop series was started in May 2000 with the objective to provide an effective forum for the discussion of recent activities and new perspectives in optical technologies. While the first workshops were dedicated to Holography and Optical Metrology (see [1], [2]), the scope of HoloMet 2010 was extended to the broader scope of advanced technologies focused around optical imaging and optical metrology. On one hand, optical imaging and optical metrology are topics with long traditions. On the other hand, the current trend in both disciplines shows an increasing dynamic that is stimulated by many fascinating innovations such as high resolution microscopy, 3D imaging and nanometrology. Consequently, both are getting younger every day and stimulate each other more and more. Thus, the main objective of the workshop was to bring experts from both fields together and to bridge these strongly related and emerging fields.

The editors are very thankful to all authors and really appreciate that they took the time out of their busy schedules to work on the book chapters to provide insights into current and future trends in optical imaging and metrology. Their dedication made it possible to present the complete collection of all contributions that were presented at the workshop. Special thanks go to our co-organizers, Zoltan F¨uzessy and Ferenc Gyimesi from the Holography Group at the Budapest University of Technology and Economics, and Sven Kr¨uger from HoloEye Photonics AG Berlin.