Optical measurements of properties in substances using propagation modes of light

1. A device for optically measuring a sample, comprising:

a light source to produce an input beam for optically probing a sample;

a waveguide having a proximal end to receive the input beam from the light source and a distal end towards which the received input beam is guided by the waveguide;

a probe head coupled to the distal end of the waveguide to receive the input beam and to reflect a first portion of the input beam back to the waveguide and direct a second portion of the input beam to the sample, the probe head configured to overlap reflection of the second portion from the sample with the first portion and to export to the waveguide the reflection as a reflected second portion;

a differential delay modulator in optical communication with the proximal end of the waveguide to receive light in the first portion and the reflected second portion from the proximal end of the waveguide, the differential delay modulator operable to split the received light into a first beam and a second beam and to produce variable relative phase delays between the first beam and the second beam; and

a detection module to detect light that combines the first beam and the second beam and is output by the differential delay modulator, the detection module operable to extract information of the sample carried by the reflected second portion at different depths in the sample based on the variable relative phase delays produced by the differential delay modulator.

2. The device as in claim 1 , wherein the optical probe head comprises a partial reflector that reflects the first portion of the input beam back to the waveguide, transmits the second portion of the input beam to the sample and collects the reflected second portion to overlap with the first portion at the partial reflector.

3. The device as in claim 1 , wherein the differential delay modulator comprises:

a beam splitter to separate light from the waveguide into a first light beam along a first optical path and a second light beam along a second optical path;

a variable optical delay element in one of the first and the second optical paths to cause the relative phase delays between the first light beam and the second light beam; and

a beam combiner to combine the first light beam and the second light beam to produce combined light.

4. The device as in claim 1 , wherein:

the light source is a broadband light source to produce the input beam with a spectral range covering different wavelengths; and wherein

the device comprises:

a tunable optical filter placed in an optical path of the input beam to filter the input beam to have a center wavelength at any one of the different wavelengths, wherein the second portion that reaches the sample is at the center wavelength of the tunable optical filter,

wherein the detector module operates to obtain measurements of the sample at the different wavelengths to measure a spectral distribution of the responses of the sample at each beam position of the second portion.

5. The device as in claim 1 , wherein:

the light source is a broadband light source to produce the input beam with a spectral range covering different wavelengths, wherein the second portion that reaches the sample has light at the different wavelengths; and

wherein the device comprises:

a tunable optical filter placed in an optical path of the first portion and the reflected second portion output by the probe head to filter light of both the first portion and the reflected second portion to have a center wavelength at any one of the different wavelengths,

wherein the detector module operates to obtain measurements of the sample at the different wavelengths to measure a spectral distribution of the responses of the sample at each beam position of the second portion.

6. The device as in claim 1 , wherein the waveguide comprises a polarization maintaining fiber.

7. The device as in claim 1 , wherein the differential delay modulator comprises:

a beam splitter to separate light from the waveguide into a first light beam along a first optical path and a second light beam along a second optical path;

a variable optical delay element in one of the first and the second optical paths to cause the relative phase delay between the first light beam and the second light beam; and

a beam combiner to combine the first light beam and the second light beam to produce combined light and to split the combined light into a first optical signal and a second optical signal; and

wherein the optical detection module comprises:

a first optical detector to receive the first optical signal;

a second optical detector to receive the second optical signal; and

an electronic unit to receive and process outputs from the first and the second optical detectors to extract the information of the sample.

8. The device as in claim 7 , wherein the first and second optical detectors are first and second detector arrays, respectively, the device further comprising:

a first grating to receive and diffract the first optical signal;

a first lens to focus different diffraction components in the first optical signal to different locations on the first detector array;

a second grating to receive and diffract the second optical signal; and

a second lens to focus different diffraction components in the second optical signal to different locations on the second detector array.