Single-shot real-time optical imaging using compressed optical-streaking ultra-high-speed photography

Single-shot real-time ultra-high-speed imaging is of significance in capturing transient phenomena. Existing techniques fall short in possessing satisfying specifications in the imaging speed, sequence depth, and pixel count. To overcome these limitations, we have developed compressed optical-streaking ultra-high-speed photography (COSUP) that records a scene (x, y, t) by applying the operations of spatial encoding, temporal shearing, and spatiotemporal integrating. The COSUP system possesses an imaging speed of 1.5 million frames per second (fps), a sequence depth of 500 frames, and a pixel count of 0.5 megapixels per frame. COSUP is demonstrated by imaging single laser pulses illuminating through transmissive targets and by tracking a fast-moving object. We envision COSUP to be applied in widespread applications in biomedicine and materials science.