Hyperspectral imaging via a multiplexing digital micromirror device

Spectral imaging technique, which retrieves both spatial and spectral information of a scene or an object, is an important tool in applications such as food inspection, vegetation monitoring and geographic remote sensing. Most spectral imaging systems have a complex system architecture, in which different components are used for different functions, limiting the efficiency of information retrieval. Here, we propose a hyperspectral imaging system with a simple architecture, where a multiplexing digital micromirror device functions both as a spatial light modulator for spatial imaging and a diffractive grating for spectral measuring simultaneously. The proof-of-principle system contains a group of lenses, a digital micromirror device and a one-dimensional detector array, and is capable of performing 128 × 128 pixel resolution hyperspectral imaging over the visible spectrum with an experimental 3.73 nm spectral resolution. Furthermore, by using a compressive sampling strategy, continuous real-time spectral video is performed with a frame-rate up to 10 Hz. The concise architecture of the proposed system, with the potential to be easily extended to both ultraviolet and infrared, offers an alternative scheme to manufacture low-cost, compact, hyperspectral imagers.