Origami lens keeps cameras slim

Engineers at UC San Diego have built a powerful yet ultrathin digital camera by folding up the telephoto lens, which could lead to high-resolution miniature cameras for a variety of applications.

This technology could in the future be used in unmanned surveillance aircraft, cell phones and infrared night vision applications.

To reduce camera thickness but retain good light collection and high-resolution capabilities, the researchers replaced the traditional lens with a ‘folded’ optical system that is based on an extension of conventional astronomical telescopes that employed mirrors.

Instead of bending and focusing light as it passes through a series of separate mirrors and lenses, the new folded system bends and focuses light while it is reflected back and forth inside a single 5mm thick optical crystal. The light is focused as if it were moving through a traditional lens system that is at least seven times thicker.

Folding the optic addresses performance issues facing cell phone cameras by increasing the effective focal length without increasing the distance from the front of the optic to the image sensor.