Deltanine

Researchers in Quebec have developed a new lens which is extremely flat and five times thinner than a sheet of paper, that they claim will revolutionise photography. With the new technology, even the smallest of cameras would be able to take perfectly clear pictures, and even get close up to their subjects with none of the distortion associated with digital zoom.

Follow up:

Vladimir Presnyakov and Tigran Galstian of the University of Laval in Quebec made their lens by adding a small amount of a light-sensitive monomer to a liquid crystal in a commercially available electro-optic cell and irradiating it with a laser beam (J. Appl. Phys. 97 103101).

The laser caused the monomers to form a polymer network, and since the intensity of the laser beam varied with position, the density of the network also varied with position. This in turn influenced the orientation of the liquid crystal molecules in the cell and the refractive index at different positions. Therefore, by carefully controlling the intensity profile of the laser, it is possible for the cell to act as a lens.

It is also possible to change the profile of the refractive index across the lens, and therefore the focal length of the lens, by applying a voltage. For instance, the Laval team was able to vary the focal length by a factor of five (from 1.6 to 8 metres) in a few milliseconds by increasing the applied voltage from 1.5 to 4.5 volts.