Optical phase space distributions for low coherence light in turbid media

Summary form only given. Optical phase space distributions are joint position and momentum distributions of light fields. They are related to the Wigner distributions for the optical field, which allows them to be placed on a firm theoretical footing. Since Wigner distributions are Fourier transforms of the mutual coherence function, optical phase space measurements are sensitive to the coherence properties of the light field. It has been suggested that coherence tomography based on measurement of the Wigner distributions may yield new avenues for medical imaging. The authors have demonstrated that smoothed Wigner phase space distributions of light fields can be measured directly as optical phase space contours using a simple heterodyne scheme.