With the idea of ”find a simple method to manufacture high-quality optical components that do not depend on mechanical processing or complex and expensive infrastructure”Scientists from the Technion (Israel Institute of Technology) have developed a method that allows obtain custom optical components from a moldable liquid polymer. This revolutionary technology could change the optics industry, including the one related to photography, by allowing to have (in minutes and with minimal infrastructure) complex lens propotypes.
To better understand what it can mean, one must know that common devices, such as glasses and camera lenses, are based on lenses with spherical or cylindrical surfaces. These optics can have deviations in their shape, even reaching complex topographies, to offer advanced optical functionalities; however, make these optics it is very difficult and expensive due to the specialized equipment needed to process and polish its surfaces.
Hence the importance of having developed a method that allows doing this with a very accessible technology “even in low-resource settings“Thanks to this method, it will be possible to quickly prototype custom optical components for a wide variety of applications such as corrective lenses (for glasses), virtual and augmented reality applications, autonomous vehicles, astronomy and medical devices and of course also photographic lenses.
The main motivation of the researchers to create this technology was the 2.5 billion people around the world who do not have access to glasses corrective. Therefore, they proposed “find a simple method to manufacture high-quality optical components that does not depend on mechanical processing or complex and expensive infrastructure”. You can see the manufacturing process in the following video:
As you have seen, the idea behind the invention is to use a liquid polymer that is immersed in another liquid. Buoyancy counteracts gravity, allowing surface tension to dominate and thus overcoming one of the main challenges in the manufacture of optics larger than 2mm: that gravity dominates over surface forces and causes the liquid to flatten and form a puddle.
By overcoming this problem, researchers can fabricate smooth optical surfaces by controlling the topography of the lens surface. This involves injecting the liquid into a support frame so that, once its interior is filled, it relaxes into a stable configuration. Once the required topography is achieved, the lens fluid solidifies on exposure to UV rays to complete the manufacturing process.
The researchers have published their work in the scientific journal Optica, where they explain how “Optical engineers are currently paying tens of thousands of dollars to obtain specially designed free-form components and have to wait months for them to arrive.”. However, its technology “is poised to dramatically reduce both lead time and cost of complex optical prototypes, which could greatly accelerate the development of new optical designs“.
Also, this method can be used to manufacture components of any size Y, “Since liquid surfaces are naturally smooth, they do not need to be polished. The approach is also compatible with any liquid that can solidify and has the advantage of not producing any waste.”.
Via | Innovation Origins / DPReview