Direct measurement of the two-point field correlation function

The space-shift-variant two-point correlation function of a transversely spatially localized optical field of arbitrary coherence at a remote plane is measured with a novel interferometric technique. The method permits reconstruction of the correlation function by a simple resorting of the measured data. In the case of a coherent field the experimentally measured correlation function is shown to factorize, as expected, and the field amplitude and phase are also reconstructed. (C) 1996 Optical Society of America