We report an image processing method which is able to break the diffraction limit for single frame images. If an image has a circularly symmetric point spread function (PSF), its spatial resolution can be enhanced by a new image processing method, the nearest neighbor pixel deconvolution (NNPD), as long as its pixel size is much smaller than distribution of the PSF. This method rewrites the PSF in terms of the nearest pixel groups, applies the Shift Theorem of the Fourier Transform to modify the PSF in the Fourier domain, and achieves a higher spatial resolution with the inverse Fourier Transform. The results of our experiment show that this method could enhance image resolution beyond the diffraction limit. We applied this method to two space images, higher resolution with some new features were shown in the processed images.

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Yu Wang and Yujing Lu, "Breaking the diffraction limit with nearest neighbor pixel deconvolution," Proc. SPIE 11017, Sensors and Systems for Space Applications XII, 1101704 (Presented at SPIE Defense + Commercial Sensing: April 15, 2019; Published: 28 May 2019); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2518647.