Peter L. P. Dillon

Principles Governing The Transfer Of Signal Modulation And Photon Noise By Amplifying And Scattering Mechanisms

A general analysis is made of the influence of stochastic amplifying and scattering mechanisms on the transfer of signal modulation and photon noise in imaging processes. In this way we quantify the spatial-frequency dependence of signal and noise as they propagate through a multistage imaging system. Whereas by definition the signal structure (or modulation) is transferred via the MTF, the input photon noise is effectively unmodulated signal and as such bypasses the MTF. However, stochastic amplification of photon noise by one stage of an imaging process may produce noise structure that constitutes an effective signal spectrum to the next. Thus, in general, it is necessary to cascade these two components of the noise spectrum separately at each stage.