Infrared Fisheye Optics

In this Phase I SBIR we will design a series of ultra-wide angle fisheye lenses suitable for fuzing sensors and their related test equipment. The lenses will be customized to cover three spectral bands from 3 microns to 12 microns as well as the visible. There are many factors that will need to be taken into account including control of radial magnification or distortion over the wide 180 degree FOV, small packaging size, low f-number and insensitivity to aerodynamic heating. Furthermore, assuming a cooled detector, the lens will need to be 100% cold stop efficient, and other factors such as narcissus will need to be taken into account. The goal for the distortion of the lenses is that an object subending a small incremental angle to the system shall be imaged to the same size or extent on the image plane regardless of where it is located in the full 180 degree field of view. This requires a lens which is corrected to near perfect f-theta distortion. We have demonstrated in this proposal the potential for achieving this goal in a relatively simple design form which can be implemented in Phase II in the spectral bands of interest.