Abstract: Camera technologies have improved drastically over the past two decades and continue to revolutionize the way we socialize, work, remember, drive, protect, shop, etc. Most of this progress is due to back-end advancements in the sensor and electronics, with little change in the optical technologies that form the image. Numerous technologies have been explored to improve imaging optics (e.g. diffractive elements, freeform design, printed or molded optics, gradient materials, metamaterials, etc.) but the impact into real systems has been very limited. We introduced a metric, the Volumetric Imaging Efficiency (VIE), to compare the resolution and size of imaging optics against fundamental limits imposed by diffraction. We show VIE is a useful tool to compare lenses of any size, shape and color (i.e. focal length, lens technology and spectral band) and use it to illustrate opportunities for new technologies to surpass the performance of conventional bulk optics. We have demonstrated opportunities for metasurface (MS) optics to advance state-of-the-art and I summarize our work designing hybrid lenses (containing refractive and metasurface elements) with large aperture, broad spectral coverage and wide field-of-view (FOV) for midwave infrared (MWIR) imaging. Next, I provide an overview of our work developing infrared imaging solutions to modern-day problems including GPS-denied navigation, invasive species mitigation and remote sensing with drones.
About the Speaker: Dr. Kyle Renshaw is an assistant professor in CREOL, the College of Optics and Photonics, at the University of Central Florida where he holds joint appointments in the Department of Physics and Electrical & Computer Engineering. He received his B.S. in Engineering Physics from Cornell University (2007), M.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Michigan (2012), and Ph.D. in Applied Physics from the University of Michigan (2014). Prior to joining CREOL, he spent two years as a physicist in the Advanced Technology Center at Northrop Grumman where he supported the development and characterization of infrared sensors for missile warning, search & track, and countermeasure systems. He joined CREOL in 2015 where he directs the Knight Vision Lab (KVL). The KVL conducts research on infrared imaging technologies from materials and components to systems and applications. Dr. Renshaw has published more than 45 journal articles and conference papers along with 7 issued patents. He is a member of OSA, SPIE, and IEEE as well as an AFOSR Summer Faculty Fellow.
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