Figure 5

Direct comparison of the enhancement of multiple molecules in the different filter configurations. Molecules tend to blink and bleach, such that statistical data processing is necessary. (a) 963 molecules, detected in a confocal configuration. The signal for the atomic notch filter is improved by 15.4% for the atomic notch filter. N = number of molecules. (b) 2337 molecules, detected in a wide-field microscope. The enhancement is shown to be 18.7%. The statistical distribution of the enhancement is wider than in the confocal case due to the generally lower SNR than in the confocal configuration.