Super-resolution Imaging of Limited-size Objects
Abstract
Improvement of label-free far-field resolution of optical imaging is possible with prior knowledge of the object such as its sparsity or accumulated by a posteriori examination of a similar class of object1-4. We show that the sole knowledge of the object's limited size is another fundamental resource to achieve resolution beyond the Abbe-Rayleigh diffraction limit: a higher resolution can be achieved with smaller objects. To prove this, we developed an imaging method that involves the representation of light scattered from the object with orthonormal field-of-view-limited Slepian-Pollak functions and experimentally demonstrated {\lambda}/8 resolution of sub-wavelength objects. Our method requires no assumption of the shape and complexity of the object and its labelling allowing a wide range of applications in the studies of nanoparticles and isolated microorganisms.
Cite
@article{arxiv.2602.00719,
title = {Super-resolution Imaging of Limited-size Objects},
author = {Taeyong Chang and Giorgio Adamo and Nikolay I. Zheludev},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2602.00719},
year = {2026}
}