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Every day, we constantly look at pixels. The small elements make up the screens of our phones and televisions, and allow us to capture images with digital cameras. Generally, a pixel works by controlling light (think a computer) or analyzing it (like a camera sensor). Now, researchers writing in the journal Nature They say they have created a pixel that can do both.
Called the Fourier pixel, the new pixel technology is based on a fundamental principle of physics: interference. When light is scattered by a surface, the waves can overlap each other, even if they originate from different points. When two or more light waves overlap, they reinforce each other. If light waves are not synchronized, they cancel each other out.
The new pixels use this phenomenon to control light with surfaces sculpted in the shape of waves. The name Fourier pixel comes from Fourier analysis, a mathematical process the team used to break down and understand how waves behaved. Each patterned area, or pixel, converts light into a surface wave that travels along the surface of the chip. Then, at a different location within the pixel, the surface wave scatters again as a light wave. These scattered light waves can be used to generate color images.
In other words, the researchers carved small patterns into a chip that allows them to control how light waves combine. These patterns allowed them to create pixels that direct and analyze light.
“Because the relevant surface profiles of the pixels can be determined by Fourier analysis, we can combine the control and analysis of amplitude, phase and polarization in a single pixel,” Sander Vonk, co-author of the study and postdoctoral researcher at ETH Zurich, said in a statement. He added that Fourier analysis is mathematically simple and does not require complex models.
The findings could have far-reaching technological applications in the future. “Therefore, our new pixels for control and analysis could become a useful tool in many areas,” said David Norris, co-author of the study and materials engineer at ETH Zurich.
Someday, we may even have pixels that capture an image and process it without the need for a computer.
But in the short term, the team has more practical goals. They want to create a Fourier pixel array that could be used to make more complex camera display devices. Still, it’s possible that in the future you’ll have a laptop screen capable of taking your photo.
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