X-ray image reconstruction from a diffraction pattern alone

TLDR

A solution to the inversion problem of scattering would provide aberration‑free diffraction‑limited 3‑D images without the resolution and depth‑of‑field limits of lens‑based tomography, but existing reconstruction methods need the object's shape and low spatial frequencies, leading to the use of powerful algorithms as virtual lenses. The study experimentally demonstrates an inversion method that reconstructs an object's image without requiring prior knowledge of its shape or low‑frequency content. The authors implement this inversion method experimentally to reconstruct the image of the object without prior knowledge.

Abstract

A solution to the inversion problem of scattering would offer aberration-free diffraction-limited three-dimensional images without the resolution and depth-of-field limitations of lens-based tomographic systems. Powerful algorithms are increasingly being used to act as lenses to form such images. Current image reconstruction methods, however, require the knowledge of the shape of the object and the low spatial frequencies unavoidably lost in experiments. Diffractive imaging has thus previously been used to increase the resolution of images obtained by other means. Here we experimentally demonstrate an inversion method, which reconstructs the image of the object without the need for any such prior knowledge.