Robust phase unwrapping algorithm based on enhanced denoising and fringe quality improvement routines

Phase unwrapping algorithms have widely been studied and implemented with efforts aimed at unwrapping wrapped phase signals. However, the presence of noise and unreliable fringe quality poses a major obstacle for the retrieval of reliable phase signals. While many techniques have been implemented to deal with the aforementioned issues, most algorithms are application dependent or difficult to implement. Here we present a simple yet effective global phase unwrapping algorithm, that does not resort to Least-Squares Minimization, making use of Fast-Fourier Transform (FFT) based spectral differentiation, Signal Dependent Rank Ordered Mean (SD-ROM) filtering, and Fuzzy Logic Edge Detection (FLED). The proposed algorithm was tested using simulated, noisy, wrapped phaseograms and has shown to improve image and fringe quality, as well as overall retrieved phase reliability.