Abstract
Imaging with undetected photons utilises induced coherence between downconverted photon pairs in a nonlinear interferometer to record an image of an object using infrared probe photons whilst only detecting photons at an easier-to-detect visible wavelength that never interacts with the object. We show that the induced coherence between photon pairs also allows for manipulation of the Fourier components of infrared light from the object, by implementing phase masks on a spatial light modulator placed in the visible beam. By applying a spiral phase mask to the visible beam we demonstrate a well-known Fourier filtering technique, namely spiral phase-contrast imaging of an object placed in the infrared beam, giving omnidirectional edge enhancement of the image. This approach could also be applied to other Fourier filtering microscopy techniques, such as dark-field and phase-contrast microscopy using undetected photons.
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All data used in this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.
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Funding
We acknowledge funding from the UK National Quantum Hub for Imaging (QuantIC EP/T00097X/1). EP acknowledges funding by the Bundesministerium für Forschung, Technologie und Raumfahrt via the grant QEED (FKZ 13N16384). SPM also acknowledges support from the Leverhulme Trust. MJP also acknowledges the financial support from the Royal Society (RSRP/R1/211013).
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The project was devised by OW, EP and MJP. The experiments were performed by OW. SPM contributed to the software analysis and TG to the optical design. All authors contributed to the writing of the manuscript.
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Wolley, O., Pearce, E., Mekhail, S.P. et al. Spiral phase infrared imaging with undetected photons using a visible wavelength spatial light modulator. Sci Rep (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-43775-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-43775-3
