Simple phase retrieval method based on two intensity measurements on asingle plane

In this work, a simple phase retrieval method is proposed by observing two intensity patterns on a single plane, which are generated with and without a lens. Rigorous theoretical derivations show that the two fields constitute the Fourier transform pairs, and a modified Gerchberg–Saxton algorithm is proposed to recover the phase patterns from the Fourier pairs. The proposed method does not require the intensity patterns to be measured on two different planes along the propagation distance, and this is quite beneficial in a system with a phase tuning element like a spatial light modulator, which can form a virtual lens by creating a parabola-like phase distribution. Experiments are conducted to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed phase retrieval method.