Collaborative Research: A Bioinspired Reconfigurable Optofluidic Device with Tunable Field-of-View and Adaptive Focusing Power

Imaging with a wide field-of-view (FOV) is important for many applications including consumer photography, surveillance, astronomy, and medical imaging. The arthropod compound eye is a beautiful design by nature for achieving imaging with a wide FOV, where an array of small lenses are situated on a hemispherical dome to view a scene at discrete perspectives. This allows arthropods to search for food and avoid predators. However, the large FOV of a compound eye is often accompanied by low image resolution. The human eye is another optical design by nature that can focus on an object in a scene and thus acquire images with high resolution and sharpness. However, the FOV of the human eye is limited. Due to the different working principles of the two vision systems in nature, optical devices are often built based on one design and cannot capture the optical performance offered by the other. This project aims at developing a new design for achieving both a wide FOV and good focusing power. This work presents a unique combination of optical characteristics of the two natural vision systems. This bio-inspired optical design could potentially surpass the current state-of-the-art and enable many applications that require a small device for achieving high quality imaging with a wide FOV. Example applications include remote surveillance and laparoscopic surgery. The project will lead to the training and education of graduate, undergraduate and K-12 students through courses and existing outreach programs. It may also lead to commercially viable products through partnerships with clinical users and industry.

This objective of this research is to investigate and implement a reconfigurable optofluidic device with a tunable FOV and adaptive focusing power. This reconfigurable optical design will significantly improve the image resolution of currently available compound lenses. The method of reducing spherical aberrations of the elastomer-liquid lenses by changing lens configurations provides a practical way to increase the effective aperture of adaptive liquid lenses. This is especially important for liquid lenses that are deformed to a great extent in order to achieve a short focal length and high optical power. The use of a curvilinear image plane that imitates the curved retinal surface of the human eye is expected to significantly reduce the aberration caused by field curvature. In addition, ultra-thin photodetector arrays with mechanical stretchability and deformability will be designed to achieve a curvilinear image plane. Such design and manufacturing strategies can be used in a broad range of optical and biomedical applications. Collectively, by allowing dynamic focusing and tunable FOV, while at the same time reducing optical aberrations, the reconfigurable optofluidic design will provide important scientific knowledge for the next-generation liquid-lens-based adaptive optics. The research outcome of this study will be disseminated to the optics, photonics, and biomedical engineering communities through conference presentations, journal publications, and social media.