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Researchers Create Artificial Insect Eye
maxzilla writes "An artificial insect eye that could be used in ultra-thin cameras has been developed by scientists in the US.The dimpled eye, contains over 8,500 hexagonal lenses packed into an area the size of a pinhead. The dome-shaped structure, described in the journal Science, is similar to a bee's eye. The researchers, from the University of California, Berkeley, say the work may also shed light on how insects developed such complex, visual systems. Darpa is also funding this project with applications expected for digital cameras and high speed motion detectors."
Biologically Inspired Artificial Compound Eyes
Ki-Hun Jeong, Jaeyoun Kim, Luke P. Lee*
This work presents the fabrication of biologically inspired artificial compound eyes. The artificial ommatidium, like that of an insect's compound eyes, consists of a refractive polymer microlens, a light-guiding polymer cone, and a self-aligned waveguide to collect light with a small angular acceptance. The ommatidia are omnidirectionally arranged along a hemispherical polymer dome such that they provide a wide field of view similar to that of a natural compound eye. The spherical configuration of the microlenses is accomplished by reconfigurable microtemplating, that is, polymer replication using the deformed elastomer membrane with microlens patterns. The formation of polymer waveguides self-aligned with microlenses is also realized by a self-writing process in a photosensitive polymer resin. The angular acceptance is directly measured by three-dimensional optical sectioning with a confocal microscope, and the detailed optical characteristics are studied in comparison with a natural compound eye.
Biomolecular Nanotechnology Center, Berkeley Sensor and Actuator Center, Department of Bioengineering, 485 Evans Hall No. 1762, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA.
* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: lplee@socrates.berkeley.edu
Compound eyes in nature present intriguing topics in physiological optics because of their unique optical scheme for imaging. For example, a bee's eye has thousands of integrated optical units called ommatidia spherically arranged along a curvilinear surface so that each unit points in a different direction (Fig. 1A). Each ommatidium consists of a light-diffracting facet lens, a crystalline cone, and photoreceptor cells with a wave-guiding rhabdom (1-3) (Fig. 1B). The omnidirectionally arranged ommatidium collects incident light with a narrow range of angular acceptance and independently contributes to the capability of wide field-of-view (FOV) detection (4-6).
Figure 1 Fig. 1. Anatomical comparisons between a natural compound eye and an artificial compound eye described from the cross sections. (A) An optical micrograph of a honeybee's apposition compound eye (courtesy of B. Greiner). As an individual optical unit, (B) a natural ommatidium consists of a facet lens, a crystalline cone, and photoreceptor cells with a wave-guiding rhabdom. (C) A scanning electron micrograph of an artificial compound eye and (D) an artificial ommatidium comprising a microlens, a polymer cone, and an optical waveguide that has a higher index core surrounded by a lower index cladding in a polymer resin. Light impinging onto a microlens is coupled with polymer cones and waveguides and then guided to the end of the waveguide. [View Larger Version of this Image (76K GIF file)]
Artificial implementation of compound eyes has attracted a great deal of research interest, because the wide FOV exhibits a huge potential for medical, industrial, and military applications. So far, imaging with a FOV over 90 has been achieved only with fish eye lenses, which rely on bulky and expensive multiple lenses and require stringent alignment. The use of miniaturized, arrayed optical components fabricated by using semiconductor planar processing technologies has been proposed to simultaneously mimic the structure and function of an individual ommatidium and the large-scale collection of ommatidia. The imaging systems using microlens arrays (7, 8) or graded index rod arrays (9, 10) in combination with matching pinhole arrays are good examples. More biomimetic efforts to implement artificial compound eyes were reviewed in (11) along with an outline of biological imaging systems. Achieving a wide FOV in those structures, however, has been hindered mainly by the inherent flatness of the arrayed optical components. In addition, the need to align multiple layers of arrayed components during assembly of the above-mentioned imaging systems gives them no advantage over fish eye lenses. For
Isn't the article posted this week about Apple's All Seeing Monitor somewhat like this?
One step closer to sharks with frickin' laser beams!
Phew, that's good, the dog's sensitive noses were having problems with the lawyer's natural oders.
I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every minute of it!
Well, almost. The argument is that they're so amazing and complex that they can only have been created by an intelligent designer, like GAWD or researchers from the University of California.
Personally, I find ID an incredibly stupid idea. Natural Selection combined with billions and billions of stars and almost infinite time is enough to explain everything in nature, imo.
But mocking intelligent design by using an example of ACTUAL intelligent design strikes me as a bit odd.
It just confirms that god currently works as a scientist in the US. Something we've known for a long time really... ;)
May contain traces of nut.
Made from the freshest electrons.
Good one :)
Anagram("United States of America") == "Dine out, taste a Mac, fries"
That summary, was very well written.
is that in case of the second, you can also try to disect the subtle mechanics of it and try to understand it
alas, as so in the first. Unfortunately, some never try, or give up altogether. I don't know why some men are made so fragile.
I'm sorry, I think I missed it. Can you point out which section if the ID manual explains particle physics?