Extending Depth-of-Field of Arbitrary Diffractive Optics with Needle-Shaped Beam Modulation

This study presents a phase-modulation technique capable of flexibly extending the depth-of-field (DOF) of any diffraction pattern. This method, deep diffractive optics (DDO), involves integrating a needle-shaped beam phase modulator with a conventional phase pattern design. Our findings reveal that these current deep diffractive optics can significantly extend the depth-of-field over traditional diffractive optics by a factor of 5. This method holds broad potential for applications in various optical devices, systems, and emerging fields of photonics.