New Filter Transforms Regular Glasses into Night Vision Lenses
Say goodbye to bulky night vision goggles. Scientists have created a lightweight night vision filter that can be attached to regular glasses.
This ultra-thin filter weighs less than a gram and allows you to see in the dark without heavy equipment. It could revolutionize night vision by making it lighter, more comfortable, and more accessible.
How It Works The “metasurface-based upconversion” technology uses tiny bumps and grooves on a thin film. Light, including invisible infrared light, bounces off this film, which boosts the infrared light’s energy and turns it into visible light.
Unlike traditional night vision, this method doesn’t need to convert light into electrons first and works at room temperature, eliminating the need for bulky coolers.
Initially, the researchers used gallium arsenide, but now they use lithium niobate, which is clear and more practical. They also spread the light beam over a larger area to avoid losing information.
The first test of this filter showed promising results. It converted infrared light at 1550 nanometers (invisible to us) into visible light at 550 nanometers. This conversion was chosen because 1550 nanometers is common in telecommunications, and 550 nanometers is where our eyes see best in low light.
Future Research Researchers plan to expand the range of wavelengths the device can detect and explore advanced image processing techniques like edge detection.
