Optical fibre based artificial compound eyes for direct static imaging and ultrafast motion detection

Area of Science:

• Biomimetics and Bioinspired Engineering
• Optics and Photonics
• Materials Science

Background:

• Natural compound eyes (NCEs) in arthropods offer excellent visual perception through ommatidia arrays.
• Existing artificial compound eyes (ACEs) struggle with mimicking NCEs' apposition modality and achieving high performance.
• Challenges include transmitting light from curved microlens arrays to flat sensors without interference.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop an ACE that faithfully mimics the structure and function of NCEs.
• To overcome limitations in current ACEs regarding static imaging and dynamic motion detection.
• To achieve real-time panoramic imaging and depth estimation with a wide field of view.

Main Methods:

• Integration of 271 lensed polymer optical fibres into a dome-like structure.
• Faithful biomimicry of the NCE ommatidia arrangement and curved surface.
• Utilizing polymer optical fibres for light transmission to a flat imaging sensor.

Main Results:

• The ACE achieved 271 ommatidia, comparable to bark beetles (272).
• A 180° field of view (FOV) was realized, matching arthropod FOVs (150-180°).
• Demonstrated ~100x improvement in dynamic response (31.3 kHz vs. 205 Hz) and high angular motion detection (5.6×10^6 °/s).

Conclusions:

• The novel ACE design successfully mimics NCEs, offering superior performance.
• Enables real-time, 180° panoramic imaging and depth estimation with a nearly infinite depth of field.
• Suitable for high-speed object capture in surveillance, robotics, and virtual reality applications.