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Pixelation-free and real-time endoscopic imaging through a fiber bundle

Endoscopy has been an indispensible tool in medical diagnostics, and yet the demands for reduced unit diameter and enhanced spatial resolution have steadily been growing for the accurate investigation of distal sites with minimal side effects. However, the attempts to make use of thin image-guiding media accompany the degradation in spatial resolution as the micro-optics often induces aberrations. Here, we present a microendoscope that performs real-time correction of severe aberrations induced by image-guiding media such as a bundled fiber. Specifically, we developed a method exploiting the full binary control of a digital micro-mirror device (DMD) for characterizing the input-output response of image-guiding media and subsequently compensating the aberrations. As a proof-of-concept study, we completely eliminated the pixelation artifact, a severe form of aberration, in endoscopic imaging through an image fiber bundle and achieved spatial resolution much better than the diameter of an individual fiber. Our study lays a foundation of applying extremely thin, but highly aberrant image-guiding media for high-resolution microendoscopy.