Fig. 5: MST images depending on the number of phase plates for a bulk scattering tissue.

a Schematic of the sample configuration. A 180-μm-thick excised mouse skull was placed on top of a custom-made resolution target. b Intensity map of the conventional confocal reflectance image of the resolution target. Scale bar, 20 µm. Color bar, normalized by the peak intensity of g. c Ballistic enhancement \({\xi }_{2}\) by MST for a single phase plate (\(N=1\)) forward model depending on the axial position of the plate. The shaded region corresponds to the approximate depth ranges of the skull tissue. d Positions of the phase plates set in the MST algorithm with the increase of the number of phase plates, \(N\). e Phase maps, and MST images depending on \(N\). MST images were normalized by the peak MST intensity for \(N=6\). Color bar for the phase plates: phase in radians. The diameter of each phase plate is given by \({L}_{k}\simeq 1.2{z}_{k}+{L}_{0}\), where \({z}_{k}\) is shown in d and \({L}_{0}=84\,{{{{{\rm{\mu }}}}}}{{{{{\rm{m}}}}}}\). f Ballistic enhancement \({\xi }_{2}\) and corresponding computation time as a function of \(N\). g Intensity map of MST image with \(N=5\). Color bar, normalized by the peak intensity.