MINIATURISED, FOCUS-TUNABLE, HIGH-SPEED MICROLENS SYSTEM FOR MICRO-OPTICS
- Summary
- A researcher from ANU is developing an atomically-thin, solid-state, electrically tunable focal length microlens system that will offer fast, high-resolution 3D image capture capabilities in miniaturised optical systems and devices.
- Technology Benefits
- The key advantages of our focus-tunable microlens system include:
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A solid-state microlens: solid-state lenses can more readily withstand fluctuations in temperature, pressure and motion than liquid based lenses and offer a more robust approach to tunable optical systems.3
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Miniaturised system: unlike most commercially available focus-tunable microlens systems our system can be made on a nano- to micro-meter scale and is suitable for integration into highly-compact optical systems and devices.
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Ultra-fast electrical tuning: our microlens can be tuned on a milli- to nano-second scale resulting in an ultra-fast response rate and picture capturing speed (current industry standard is measured in terms of seconds).
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Flexible: most microlenses on the market are made out gel-polymer and/or liquid crystals which means they have limited flexibility. In contrast, our MoS2-based microlens is extremely flexible which will enable its incorporation into wearable devices, LEDs and other flexible micro-optic components.
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Large bandwidth: metasurface-based (i.e. surfaces with tunable metamaterial structures) microlenses have small working bandwidths that are fundamentally limited by the resonance mechanism. Alternatively, our MoS2-based microlens has a large working bandwidth and small loss.
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Lightweight: our system is extremely lightweight and thus suitable for applications in aerospace and micro-air (MAC) vehicles.
- Technology Application
- The key markets for our microlens system are endoscopy, 3D cameras, and bimodal fingerprinting.
- Detailed Technology Description
- A researcher from ANU has established a method to fabricate an atomically-thin, reflective, concave microlens.
Using micro- and nano-machining, this researcher has created the world’s thinnest lens (with a thickness < 6.3 nm) consisting of a few layers of molybdenum disulphide (MoS2) on a silicon dioxide (SiO2)/Si substrate.5 This microlens is currently being used in the development of a miniature, focus-tunable, high-speed microlens system suitable for integration into very-compact optical devices. This system will (I) be made on a nano- to micro-metre scale, (II) be electronically tunable using a metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) device, (III) be tunable at a very high speed (in the range of milli- to nano-seconds), and (IV) have a flexible and transparent polymer substrate. This system will be tailorable to specific demands in terms of size, tuning range, transmission range and transmission speed. This system’s simple structure and reduced size means it will be able to be used in a new range of products (e.g. webcams, laptops, smartphones, endoscopes, optical coherence tomography cameras, biochips, flexible photonics devices, and more) and applications (e.g. optically configurable optical microsystems and microscale fabrication techniques).
- Type of Cooperation
- Licensing/ commercial development
- Application Date
- 28/07/2017 00:00:00
- Application No.
- AU2017902973
- Classes
- N/A
- Country/Region
- Australia
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