Circumventing the Talbot effect with a ghost imaging microscopy

The Talbot effect also known as self-imaging is a near-field diffraction phenomenon inherent to regular structures under coherent light illumination. This phenomenon finds applications in broad areas including metrology, imaging and spectrometry. The present paper considers the Talbot effect under spatially incoherent light illumination using optical and ghost imaging microscopy. The experimental and theoretical results provide fascinating property of ghost imaging microscopy for overcoming the classical Talbot effect. This property is found to be attributed to the fact that in the ghost imaging microscopy the lens condition in the object channel can be violated. This finding provides new possibilities for observing regular structures via the ghost imaging microscopy without self-imaging.