Virtual‐Moving Metalens Array Enabling Light‐Field Imaging with Enhanced Resolution

• Published in: Advanced optical materials Vol. 8; no. 21
• Main Authors: Park, Min‐Kyu, Park, Chul‐Soon, Hwang, Yong Seok, Kim, Eun‐Soo, Choi, Duk‐Yong, Lee, Sang‐Shin
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Weinheim Wiley Subscription Services, Inc 01-11-2020
• Subjects: Angular resolution; Arrays; Image reconstruction; Imaging techniques; light‐field imaging; Luminous intensity; Materials science; metasurface lens array; Microlenses; Microscopes; multifunctional metasurface; Optics; Parallax; Polarization; polarization‐dependent movable lens array; resolution improvement; Sampling; Spatial resolution
• ISSN: 2195-1071; 2195-1071
• DOI: 10.1002/adom.202000820

The light‐field (LF) imaging technique can obtain the light intensity and directional ray distribution information by utilizing a microlens array (MLA). Based on the recoded 3D information, full‐parallax or depth‐slice images can be reconstructed. Due to the limited ray sampling rate of the MLA, however, conventional LF imaging schemes are fatally susceptible to a trade‐off between the spatial and angular resolution. To mitigate this issue, a virtual‐moving metalens array (VMMA) based on a multifunctional dielectric metasurface is proposed, which can laterally shift the sampling position without physical movement, by simply tailoring the polarization of incident beam. Thanks to the polarization‐tailored VMMA, the LF imaging scheme is successfully realized to provide a fourfold enhanced spatial resolution without sacrificing the angular resolution.
Virtual‐moving metalens array (VMMA) can laterally shift the sampling position without physical movement, by simply tailoring the polarization of incident beam. Thanks to the polarization‐tailored VMMA, the light‐field imaging scheme is successfully realized to provide a fourfold enhanced spatial resolution without sacrificing the angular resolution.