Laser, Optics & Photonics

Virtual world of Photonics

Head-up displays bring project information and warnings directly into the driver's field of vision. Expanded reality (AR) projections on the windshield have recently been developed and controlled using confusing optics. Weakness: The frames take up too much room in the officially crowded dashboard and only allow a small amount of glare. The manufacturer of automotive components Continental is going a different route that is also dependent on photonics, along with its affiliated company, the US start up DigiLens Inc. Instead of using optics to manipulate the light, extremely well-organized optical waveguides are used. The inventive structure duplicates the field of vision and reduces the establishment space to a sixth of its current size. Even pilot and motorcycle headgear can be equipped with the shrunk-down HUDs to make AR data clearly visible in the field of vision.

DigiLens uses a holographic photopolymer that the company developed to build fine diffractive structures in place of focal points and mirrors. These waveguides for red, green, and blue light are coupled to these Bragg gratings using a practical ink fly printing technique. The catch: The polymer, or more precisely the degree of its diffraction, is switchable electrically. Switchable Bragg gratings (SBGs) function as an optical "framework on a chip" by diffracting, shaping, enlarging, and finally activating the light stored in optical wave-controls on the target surface. It is supported by an information module made up of an RGB LED module and a Pico projector.