Effectiveness of digital dispersion compensation in OCT

Dispersion mismatch in optical coherence tomography (OCT) is typically addressed through either physical or digital compensation. In this study, we investigate the impact of dispersion on OCT detection sensitivity and compare the effectiveness of physical and digital compensation across varying degrees of dispersion mismatch. Our results demonstrate that while digital dispersion compensation can effectively restore detection sensitivity, its efficacy is constrained by the severity of the dispersion mismatch. Beyond a certain threshold, digital compensation fails to fully recover image information, leading to degradation in image quality.