New salt-grain sized micro camera takes images on par with a full size camera’s | Hacker News Reader

New salt-grain sized micro camera takes images on par with a full size camera’s

freethink.com

11 pointslobo_tuerto5 comments

> By combining the physical properties of their micro camera with this algorithmic optimization, the team could produce images a considerable step up from the current cutting edge.

> Although the approach to optical design is not new, this is the first system that uses a surface optical technology in the front end and neural-based processing in the back

No link to the paper, or a title. The above makes it sound like this isn’t an improved camera, but improved image reconstruction, which may or may not be related to reality.

> The secret lies in over a million “eyes,” roughly the size of an HIV virus, covering the camera, known as its metasurface.

Does TFA mean the 1 million cameras are the size of a single HIV virus, or a million HIV virii?

I read that as each camera is the size of a virus and that there are a million of them on the surface of the device.

Even still, HIV are so small they will still be a grain of rice or smaller.

They are talking about the photon seive micro lenses that make up the whole lens. Each micro lens is the size of a virus. The "camera" is the size of a grain of salt.

I don't think this is intentional, but this feels like trigger bait for people dealing with a manic psychotic state. Like there were other things to compare it to other than an HIV virus. I'm sure it's exactly the same size, but you know, might as well say "the same size as a large Coronavirus wrapped in 5G Monkeypox". Also,

> The researchers believe their micro camera could be dusted on a surface, making anything a camera. (Perhaps not the most comforting thought, as Nerdist points out.)

I think this is really interesting technology. I was suspecting something similar would arrive after learning about making optical tensors that you print in 3D space and learning more about "photon sieves". This is a weird part of our future. There are really interesting new on a chip photonics methods to generate targetable full spectrum light out of a single laser light source.

2025 we'll see some really really crazy light processing products.

- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TshYfYIxR9E

- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1t9znJloJx8

- https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31631480/

- https://www.allaboutcircuits.com/podcast/us-semi-fab-skywate...

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