NLOM is a totally non-invasive technique based on the excitation of the non-linear optical response that is generated in any material upon excitation with laser pulses of very short duration, in the range of femtoseconds. NLOM can operate under different modalities (i.e. Multiphoton Excitation Fluorescence, Second and Third Harmonic Generation) and provides information, on three dimensions with microscopic resolution, on the presence of layers of different chemical nature, their thickness or their crystalline or hierarchical internal organization.
The combined use of the different NLOM modalities derives information, in a totally non-invasive way, on the presence of layers of different chemical nature, their thickness or their crystalline or hierarchical internal organization. It is possible to obtain highly contrasted 3D images at the micrometer scale, without any preparation or sampling, of the artifacts.