Angle-adjusting device for beam steering, featuring two transparent optical components made of liquid crystal polymer, designed for diffractive purposes
In a groundbreaking development, a team of researchers led by Professor Markus A. Schmidt from the Leibniz Institute of Photonic Technology and Friedrich Schiller University in Jena, Germany, have unveiled a miniature planar telescope. This innovative device, presented in a new paper published in Light: Science & Applications, promises to revolutionise the field of LiDAR applications by expanding the currently limited steering range.
The miniature planar telescope is a cascaded LC flat-optics element, made from LC diffractive devices in millimeter sizes with various f/#. Unlike traditional telescopes, this device is remarkably thin, with a total effective thickness usually in the order of 1 Ξm. This makes it a promising candidate for non-mechanical beam steering.
The team fabricated and assembled two telescope modules with designed magnification factors. The all-solution process used for fabricating LC polymer-based planar optics was employed in the construction of these modules. This process sets the miniature planar telescope apart from other commercial-quality transmissive lenses, gratings, optical vortex processors, and dielectric metasurfaces that have been developed in recent years.
The miniature planar telescope consists of two flat optical elements separated in space. The design of this telescope module allows for steering angle magnification independent of the incident beam position. This unique feature enables the telescope to provide a broader steering range, especially beneficial for LiDAR applications.
The research focuses on this miniature planar telescope based on patterned liquid crystals. In recent years, there has been a growing interest in flat optics based on patterned liquid crystals (LCs). The engineering of their operating spectral/angular bands has been illustrated in both passive and active devices.
This innovative development is a significant step forward in the field of optics and LiDAR technology. The potential applications of the miniature planar telescope extend beyond LiDAR, making it a versatile tool for various optical systems. The research was published with the DOI: 10.1038/s41377-021-00576-9.
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