Author Topic: Interesting new lens technology (Link)  (Read 1543 times)

Tristin

  • NG Member
  • *
  • Posts: 1083
  • Nothing less, always more.
-Tristin

richardHaw

  • Cute Panda from the East...
  • NG Supporter
  • **
  • Posts: 3134
  • Your lens loverboy
    • Classic Nikkor Maintenance and DIY
Re: Interesting new lens technology (Link)
« Reply #1 on: June 08, 2016, 05:05:57 »
what sorcery is this!? :o :o :o

Tristin

  • NG Member
  • *
  • Posts: 1083
  • Nothing less, always more.
Re: Interesting new lens technology (Link)
« Reply #2 on: June 08, 2016, 06:27:20 »
Currently a very specialized optical sorcery, but the possible applications for this as a base are numerous and powerful.
-Tristin

richardHaw

  • Cute Panda from the East...
  • NG Supporter
  • **
  • Posts: 3134
  • Your lens loverboy
    • Classic Nikkor Maintenance and DIY
Re: Interesting new lens technology (Link)
« Reply #3 on: June 08, 2016, 07:46:14 »
i hope that it wont get fungus :o :o :o

i can see some uses in the medical field.

Les Olson

  • NG Member
  • *
  • Posts: 502
  • You ARE NikonGear
Original paper and the fly in the ointment.
« Reply #4 on: June 08, 2016, 08:58:33 »
The original paper is at http://science.sciencemag.org/content/352/6290/1190 - behind a pay wall, however.  More technical details are free at http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/2016/jun/02/high-efficiency-flat-lenses-shrink-down-to-the-nanoscale

It is the Rayleigh criterion and the Airy disc again: the diameter of two points just resolvable = 1.22 x numerical aperture x wavelength of light.  They can achieve effective NA = 0.8: the diameter of the Airy disc can be below the wavelength, which is what they mean by "sub-wavelength resolution". 

The catch is that the process only works with polarised light, and at present can only focus one visible wavelength at a time.  Unless and until they solve that problem the approach will only work with single-wavelength imaging - which is OK for microscopy but not so good for photography.  The other issue is that the best they could do was get 86% of light to be image-forming: ie, flare is a problem for imaging.