In the research field of diffraction calculation and digital holography， the author had conducted many subjects supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China. Furthermore， they had carried out cooperation on scientific research and teaching with Institut National des Sciences Appliquee de Lyon， Ecole Centrale de Lyon， Ecole Nationale Superieure des Arts et Meties de Paris and Universite du Maine， and directed PhD students both in China and France.
Through the long-term scientific research and teaching practice， the authors deeply realized that with the improvement of computer technology， it is satisfying to solve quantities of practical problems in laser application research by using the scalar diffraction theory correctly， However，the diffraction calculation is very difficult， just as M.Born and E.Wolf once noted in their book Pri'nciples of Optics that"Diffraction problems are amongst the most difficult ones encountered in optics. Solutions which， in some sense， can be regarded as rigorous are very rare in diffraction theory".
There are few discussions about diffraction calculation methods among currently popular optical works， which forms the barrier to study and do research on optical information. For many years， the authors wished to systemically summarize the experience in this research field and provide references for laser application researchers and postgraduates by taking digital holography as an application carrier to calculate different diffraction values.
In 2012， under the strong support of the Ministry of Education and Ministry of Science and Technology of France， the French verson and English version of Hotographie numerique written by the author Li Junchang and his French cooperator Professor P. PICART were published by HERMES Press in France and WILEY Press in UK respectively. But the diffraction numeric calculation theory was not introduced in a systemic way for the limit of the book name.
Recently， new progress is achieved in the international research field of diffraction calculation and digital holography， and digital holographic 3D display gradually becomes a research focus. Therefore， the authors devoted themselves to rewriting a book named Diffraction Calculation and Digitat Holography to introduce diffraction numeric calculation theory systemically. In this book， digital holography will be taken as an application carrier to calculate diffraction values and the calculation of diffraction field of spatial curved surface and its application to holographic 3D display will be added. Now， the Chinese version of Diffraction Calculation and Digital Holography was published by Beijing Science Press in June， 2014. In order to introduce this book to more readers， the book is rewritten in English. Some new achievements of the authors in the research field of diffraction calculation and digital holographic 3D display are also added. The book is still published by Beijing Science Press.
The experiments in this book are basically selected from the authors' scientific researches at home and abroad. The holographic 3D display experiment based on LCOS in Chapter 9 is made with the kind help of Professor Zheng Chaoren from National Taiwan Normal University. All the programs in this book are written by the authors with MATLAB7.0 platform and they are testified through experiments. With great efforts， the authors hopes to make this book a beneficial reference for the researchers， postgraduates and engineering technicians who work for laser application. Since the limits of the authors' ability， readers are welcome to correct the deficiencies and mistakes if there are any. Please contact the author Wu Yanmei by.