We demonstrate that super-resolution imaging of specimens containing sub-diffraction-limited features is feasible by using dielectric microwires fabricated through capillary force lithography followed by photopatterning. As supplementary micron scale cylindrical lenses, we fabricated uniform-sized microwires with and 5 and 10 μm diameters and refractive index ~1.3-1.6. The microwires are placed in contact with the specimen to collect the information of the sub-wavelength features of the specimen and transmit them to the far-field with magnification enabling imaging with two-fold resolution improvement. Potential applications of our imaging technique include biological imaging, microfluidics, and nanophotonics applications.

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Arash Darafsheh, Gaoxiang Wu, Shu Yang, and Jarod C. Finlay, "Super-resolution optical microscopy by using dielectric microwires," Proc. SPIE 9713, Three-Dimensional and Multidimensional Microscopy: Image Acquisition and Processing XXIII, 97130U (Presented at SPIE BiOS: February 16, 2016; Published: 9 March 2016); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2211431.