An apparatus for optically imaging a sample comprises: a broadband laser (1); a spatial disperser (2) for spectrally encoding the gradient phase contrast information; a passive phase-gradient-encodedsignal multiplexer (5) for performing passive phase- gradient-encoded signal multiplexing; and means (8) for performing digital signal demultiplexing and image reconstruction for quantitative phase image retrieval. The apparatus can provided a high-throughput, high-content label-free quantitative imaging of the single-cell information.
APPARATUS AND METHOD FOR QUANTITATIVE PHASE-GRADIENT CHIRPED-WAVELENGTH-ENCODED OPTICAL IMAGING