Integrated optical sensor in glass for optical coherence tomography (OCT)

The in vivo examination of tissue structures (e.g., human skin, eye retina) by optical coherence tomography is a powerful tool for pharmaceutical and medical research for the development of new drugs and new diagnostic method s, The parallel integration of eight Michelson interferometers including al l reference light paths in one small glass chip is the basis of a compact s ensor system with a high resolution, short measurement time, and a large pe netration depth especially in almost opaque tissue such as the human skin, The interferometer array is fabricated with silver ion exchanged waveguides .