Chinese researchers have developed an optical chip the size of a fingernail that can analyse light in real time with a precision once possible only with bulky laboratory instruments. They hope to test it using the largest optical telescope on Earth.
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The breakthrough could enable an unprecedented level of visual intelligence in machines ranging from drones and robots to medical scanners and telescopes, according to Fang Lu and her team at Tsinghua University.
In a paper published this week by the journal Nature, the researchers reported that their creation, called Yuheng or Rafael, can distinguish colours separated by less than a 10th of a nanometre and at roughly 100 times sharper than comparable snapshot imagers.
Building on advances in optics, artificial intelligence and materials science, the chip overcomes a long-standing trade-off between resolution and efficiency in visible and near-infrared imaging, they said.
According to Science and Technology Daily, Yuheng is capable of recording the colour signatures of nearly 10,000 stars each second – potentially shortening the time needed to map the Milky Way from millennia to less than a decade.
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In a statement on Wednesday, the researchers said they were moving from a proof-of-concept prototype to an engineering model, which they planned to test on the Gran Telescopio Canarias in Spain’s Canary Islands.
At 10.4 metres (34 feet), it is the world’s largest single-aperture optical telescope and is used to explore stars, galaxies, dark matter, black holes and other frontiers of astrophysics.