Fast and accurate active alignment of camera lenses with physics-informed deep learning

As optical systems become increasingly complex, accurate and fast alignment is becoming more critical. Active alignment (AA) techniques dynamically optimize optical positioning using real-time image quality feedback, ensuring better performance and higher production yields. However, in large-scale manufacturing, such as smartphone lens production, existing AA techniques struggle to balance speed and accuracy. In this paper, we propose a pipeline for AA using physics-informed deep learning. Our pipeline consists of two main components: a physics-informed tolerance estimation neural network (TolNet) that estimates tolerances from point spread functions (PSFs) and an optical optimization module that determines the adjustment parameters for AA. TolNet is trained with a strategy that combines data-driven and physics-driven losses, enabling it to produce physically plausible results. TolNet performs tolerance estimation with exceptional speed, completing the process in less than 0.01 seconds, while the optical optimization module is also highly efficient, requiring less than 3 seconds. We conducted extensive experiments to validate the performance of our proposed method, which offers a promising solution to improve the efficiency and accuracy of AA in large-scale manufacturing.