Imaging

Expanding Copernicus’s Earth Observation Program With Hyperspectral Imaging

The Copernicus program is a European Union (EU) initiative for Earth observation and environmental monitoring. Its primary objective is to provide accurate, timely, and reliable information for environmental and security purposes.

The New Industrial Edge Ecosystem for Machine Vision

Siemens is collaborating with Basler and MVTec in its open Industrial Edge Ecosystem. The results are scalable, plug-and-play solutions that combine Siemens’ automation technology with third-party machine vision hardware and software.

Catching Lightning With Phantom Cameras

Astroparticle Physicist Dr. Rasha Abbasi, an Assistant Professor in the Department of Physics at Loyola University Chicago, works with the Telescope Array project. Located west of Delta, Utah, the project is an international collaboration between universities to observe high-energy cosmic rays. Abbasi and her team study how TGFs originate from the Earth’s atmosphere and propagate. In particular, the team hopes to answer key questions.

New Products

See the new products, including TRIOPTICS’ ATS alignment turning stations, VIAVI Solutions' expanded fiber optic test solutions portfolio, LumeDEL's fiberoptic collimating lenses, Teledyne FLIR's Neutrino LC OGI optical gas imaging camera module, and IDS' Sony sensor.

Optical Invention Mirrors the Image Processing Power of a Human Eye

Mimicking the easy, instantaneous image processing power of the human eye, Penn State electrical engineering researchers created a metasurface, an optical element akin to a glass slide that uses tiny nanostructures, placed at different angles to control light.

Advancements Make Laser-Based Imaging Simpler and Three-Dimensional

There are times when scientific progress comes in the form of discovering something completely new. Other times, progress boils down to doing something better, faster, or more easily. New research from the lab of Caltech’s Lihong Wang, the Bren Professor of Medical Engineering and Electrical Engineering, is the latter. Read on to learn more.

Properly Tolerancing Aspheric Lenses to Balance Cost and Performance

Understanding how to effectively tolerance aspheres is an incredibly useful communication tool to get the most out of your lens. In this article, we will provide some context behind asphere tolerances, exploring the factors that influence cost and performance.

Microwave Sensing Technology Enables Versatile Imaging

Microwave sensing and imaging (MSI) technology, which has been in for many years, has now improved to the point that it may usefully supplement or even replace MRI machines and CT scanners in certain applications, including stroke detection and breast cancer detection.

Treating Liver Cancer with Microrobots Piloted by a Magnetic Field

The idea of injecting microscopic robots into the bloodstream to heal the human body is not new. It’s also not science fiction.

Liquid Crystals Hold the Key to Shapeshifting Robots

Robots and cameras of the future could be made of liquid crystals, thanks to a new discovery that significantly expands the potential of the chemicals already common in computer displays and digital watches. The findings are a simple and inexpensive way to manipulate the molecular properties of liquid crystals with light exposure.

Coherent Establishes 6-inch InP Wafer Fabrication Capability

Coherent has established what the company describes as the "world's first capability for 6-inch indium phosphide (InP) wafer fabrication." The compound semiconductor and...

Researchers Claim Lowest Ever Microwave Noise on a Integrated Photonic Chip

In a new Nature study, Columbia Engineering researchers have built a photonic chip that is able to produce high-quality, ultra-low-noise microwave signals using...

Processing Trillions of Images Per Second

Achieving speed records is not just for athletes. Researchers can also achieve this kind of feat thanks to their discoveries. This is the case of professor at the National Institute of Scientific...

Restoring Sight to Euclid's Visible Instrument System

A newly devised procedure to de-ice Euclid's optics has performed significantly better than hoped. Light coming in to the visible ‘VIS’ instrument from distant stars was gradually...

Using AI to Track Professional Hockey Players

Researchers from the University of Waterloo used artificial intelligence (AI) tools to help capture and analyze data from NHL games faster and more accurately than ever before; the work has big implications for the business of sports.

Using AI to Identify Poison Ivy

To find poison ivy before it finds you, University of Florida scientists published a new study in which they use artificial intelligence (AI) to confirm that an app can identify poison ivy.

Product of the Month

See the product of the month: 2Pi Optics' high-resolution fisheye sensor based on optical metalens technology.

New on the Market

See what's new on the market, including igus' two- and four-hole fixed flange bearings; FixtureBuilder 3D fixture-modelling software from Renishaw; XENON Corporation's X-1100/2x Pulsed Light Research System; Rad Source NDT's NDT 1000 X-ray Inspection System; and more.

Amateur Drone Videos Could Aid Natural Disaster Damage Assessment

By using artificial intelligence, researchers are developing a system that can automatically identify buildings after disasters and make an initial determination of whether they are damaged and how serious that damage might be.

NASA’s Ruggedized Video Camera Ready for Earth

A ruggedized video camera designed to withstand the shock, vibration, and extreme temperatures of space is now ready for extreme conditions on Earth.

AI-Powered Self-Driving Microscopy Technique

Researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory have developed an autonomous, or self-driving, microscopy technique. It uses AI to selectively target points of interest for scanning. Read on to learn more.

Metasurfaces Control Polarized Light at Will

Researchers at SEAS have uncovered hidden potential in metasurfaces and demonstrated optical devices that manipulate light’s polarization state with an unprecedented degree of control. Read on to learn more.

Terahertz Energy Focused by Credit Card-Sized Device to Generate High-Resolution Images

Researchers have created a device that enables them to electronically steer and focus a beam of terahertz electromagnetic energy with extreme precision. This opens the door to high-resolution, real-time imaging devices that are hundredths the size of other radar systems and more robust than other optical systems.

High-Brightness Source of Coherent Light Spanning from the UV to THz

An international team of researchers reports on a compact high-brightness mid-IR-driven source combining a gas-filled anti-resonant-ring photonic crystal fiber with a novel nonlinear-crystal. The tabletop source provides a seven-octave coherent spectrum from 340 nm–40,000 nm with spectral brightness 2–5 orders of magnitude higher than one of the brightest synchrotron facilities.

Highest-Resolution Single-Photon Superconducting Camera

The NIST camera is made up of grids of ultrathin electrical wires, cooled to near absolute zero, in which current moves with no resistance until a wire is struck by a photon. In these superconducting-nanowire cameras, the energy imparted by even a single photon can be detected because it shuts down the superconductivity at a particular location (pixel) on the grid. Combining all the locations and intensities of all the photons makes up an image.

Expanding Copernicus’s Earth Observation Program With Hyperspectral Imaging

Last June, the European Commission and the European Space Agency awarded Kuva Space a €5M commercial contract to be the sole provider of hyperspectral data...

Photonics West 2024: 5 New Technologies on Display This Year

The largest optics and trade show in North America, SPIE Photonics West 2024, is just a few days away from its annual collection of exhibitions, conferences and courses at San...