Ionic polymer metal composite for an optical zoom in a compact camera

The reflective method is utilized in the optical zoom function of a thin camera for the advantage of folding the optical path. An ionic polymer metal composite deformable mirror used in a reflective zoom system achieves large deformations to change optical power with a low bias voltage. Polydimethylsiloxane is used as a buffer layer to improve surface roughness. The surface roughness of this layer is about 17 nm. The optical focusing power of the deformable mirror reaches 73.8 m(-1) diopters with 3 volts. A complete reflective camera module is fabricated using two ionic polymer metal composite deformable mirrors in the zoom function. The zoom ratio is about 1.6 × .