Integrated spectrometers for spectral-domain optical coherence tomography

Optical coherence tomography (OCT) [1] is a non-invasive optical technique for high-resolution cross-sectional imaging of biological systems. Current OCT systems are bulky and costly. A significant decrease in the size of OCT systems is possible through integrated optics. In this work, we present the design and fabrication of arrayed waveguide gratings (AWGs) at 800 and 1300 nm as these wavelengths are commonly applied to retina and skin imaging, respectively. We perform interferometric depth ranging measurements with AWG spectrometers in a spectral-domain OCT (SD-OCT) set-up thus demonstrating the first important step toward miniaturization of an OCT system in silicon-oxynitride (SiON) for the 800-nm and 1300-nm spectral ranges.