Design and fabrication of fluid controlled dynamic optical lens system

A novel small fluid controlled optical lens system that is capable of displaying dynamic variation of its focal length and field-of-view (FOV) is designed and fabricated. In this active lens system, appropriate volume of the optical fluid can be pumped into or out of the lens chamber to provide double-convex (DCX) or double-concave (DCV) lens effect. Simple optical imaging experiments were performed using different sets of glass lenses with fixed focal lengths to determine the optimum lens configuration required for designing a dynamic optical lens system. The experimental results obtained from the glass lenses demonstrate that a combination of a single DCX lens with three DCV lenses provides a wider FOV. The flexible membranes for fluid controlled lenses were fabricated using polydimethylsiloxane polymer material, which has good optical transparency and elasticity. A simple fluid injection system is used to vary the radius of curvature of the lenses, and thereby to change the focal length. A dynamic optical lens system with a combination of one DCX and multiple variable focal length DCV lenses as designed here can image an object with a wide range of focal length and FOV. With this fluid controlled optical system, the FOV and focal length could be continuously varied and a maximum FOV of 118.3° could be achieved. The smallest f-number (f_/#) for this fluid controlled single lens system was found to be 1.3, which corresponds to the numerical aperture value of 0.35.