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Flying Insects and Robots pp 127–142Cite as

Microoptical Artificial Compound Eyes

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Abstract

The cost–benefit ratio of miniaturized single aperture eyes underlies certain limitations, so that evolution led to the development of multi-aperture eyes in case of tiny creatures like invertebrates. Physical constraints, which also apply for the miniaturized artificial imaging systems, make this natural evolutionary path comprehensible. Shrinking down to a sub-millimeter range, the use of parallel imaging with multi-aperture systems is crucial. In this domain, microoptical design approaches and fabrication techniques are the solution of choice. This technology allows the realization of cost-efficient miniaturized imaging systems with sub-micron precision by means of photolithography and replication. The approaches proposed here are mainly inspired by insect vision in nature, although they are bound to planar substrates.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    In the following the term multi-channel imaging systems will be used.

  2. 2.

    Due to its single channel setup including one or a few lenses and at least one aperture, all aligned on a common axis, we will further call this single aperture optical system.

  3. 3.

    This ratio is called the stop number or F-number F/#.

  4. 4.

    Compared to the temporal sampling of human vision of about 25 frames per second a fly samples about 10 times faster (approx. 250 Hz) [13].

  5. 5.

    Optical axis denotes the straight line which connects the center of a single microlens with the center of the associated photoreceptor. Thus, “axially” means in direction along the optical axis.

  6. 6.

    In the following this will be called “redundant sampling.”

  7. 7.

    Even though the neural superposition type could expand activities of its owner into light conditions of dawn and dusk.

  8. 8.

    Such a setup became known as the “Gabor superlens.”

  9. 9.

    This is referred to as pitch difference Δ p.

  10. 10.

    Here, regular means that all lenslets are exactly the same.

  11. 11.

    Defined by the total number of pixels in the digital image.

  12. 12.

    Compared to the artificial apposition compound eye a segment of the individual channel is considerably larger (e.g., by a factor of ten).

  13. 13.

    A process chain which is carried out for many components in parallel on these circular carrier substrates with a diameter of up to 300 mm is called a “wafer scale” process.

  14. 14.

    Binary photomasks have apertures allowing the UV light to locally expose the underlying polymer and opaque regions that block UV light.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Sylke Kleinle, Andre Matthes, Antje Oelschläger, and Simone Thau from the Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Optics and Precision Engineering (IOF), Jena, for their contributions to the fabrication of the various types of artificial apposition compound eye objectives using microoptics technology. Special thanks is dedicated to Reinhard Völkel from SUSS MicroOptics SA (Neuchâtel, Switzerland) for his inspiring previous work and helpful discussions about bio-inspired imaging. The experience of Martin Eisner (also SUSS MicroOptics) in aligned stacking of microlens array wafers finally led to the realization of the cluster eye. We are furthermore very thankful for the help we got from our colleagues from the Institute of Microtechnology (IMT) of the University of Neuchâtel, Switzerland, especially Toralf Scharf who took very important steps in the fabrication of the lens- and aperture arrays of the cluster eye. The presented work was partly funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) within the project “Extremely compact imaging systems for automotive applications” (FKZ: 13N8796).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Optics and Precision Engineering, Albert-Einstein-Str. 7, D-07745, Jena, Germany

    Andreas Brückner, Jacques Duparré, Frank Wippermann, Peter Dannberg & Andreas Bräuer

Authors
  1. Andreas Brückner
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  2. Jacques Duparré
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  3. Frank Wippermann
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  4. Peter Dannberg
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  5. Andreas Bräuer
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Correspondence to Andreas Brückner .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratory of Intelligent Systems, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Lausanne, 1015, Switzerland

    Dario Floreano

  2. Laboratory of Intelligent Systems, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Lausanne, 1015, Switzerland

    Jean-Christophe Zufferey

  3. Queensland Brain Institute, University of Queensland, St. Lucia, 4072, Australia

    Mandyam V. Srinivasan

  4. Dept. Zoology, University Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge, CB2 3EJ, United Kingdom

    Charlie Ellington

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Brückner, A., Duparré, J., Wippermann, F., Dannberg, P., Bräuer, A. (2009). Microoptical Artificial Compound Eyes. In: Floreano, D., Zufferey, JC., Srinivasan, M., Ellington, C. (eds) Flying Insects and Robots. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-89393-6_10

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-89393-6_10

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