Re-imaging optical system employing refractive and diffractive optical elements
First Claim
1. A re-imaging optical system comprising:
- an objective lens means for focusing an incoming beam of light to a first image plane;
a relay lens means for refocusing said beam of light in a second image plane after it has passed through said first image plane; and
said relay lens means including a binary optical element which introduces magnifying power in addition to any magnifying power introduced by refraction in the relay lens, the binary optical element also correcting aberrations introduced by said objective and relay lens means.
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Abstract
A re-imaging optical system (36) is provided which utilizes a combination of refractive and diffractive optical elements. The system includes an objective lens group (38) for focusing an incoming beam of light to a first image plane. A relay lens group (40) refocuses the beam of light in a second image plane after it passes through the first image plane. The relay lens group (40) includes a diffractive optical element (48) for correcting aberrations introduced by the objective and relay lens groups. The diffractive optical element (48) eliminates a number of individual optical elements which would otherwise be required to correct aberrations, thereby reducing the total number of optical elements in the system. In the preferred embodiment, the diffractive optical element (48) comprises a binary optical element. The resulting system yields better image quality, better throughput, and a lighter, less bulky, re-imaging optical system (36).
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Citations
18 Claims
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1. A re-imaging optical system comprising:
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an objective lens means for focusing an incoming beam of light to a first image plane; a relay lens means for refocusing said beam of light in a second image plane after it has passed through said first image plane; and said relay lens means including a binary optical element which introduces magnifying power in addition to any magnifying power introduced by refraction in the relay lens, the binary optical element also correcting aberrations introduced by said objective and relay lens means. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
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10. An optical system comprising:
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a first lens means for focusing an incoming beam of light to an image plane; a second lens means for receiving and refracting said beam of light after it passes through said image plane; said first and second lens means together being partially self correcting of aberrations according to the symmetry principle, whereby the aberrations in said first and second lens means tend to balance each other out; and a binary optical element in the path of said beam of light which introduces magnifying power in addition to any magnifying power introduced by refraction in the second lens means the binary optical element also correcting a portion of the optical aberrations not corrected by said first and second lens means. - View Dependent Claims (11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17)
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18. A re-imaging optical system comprising:
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an objective lens means for focusing an incoming beam of infrared light to a first image plane; a relay lens means for refocusing said beam of light in a second image plane after it has passes through said first image plane; said objective lens means and said relay lens means both containing silicon aspherical refractive lenses which tend to balance out their respective aberrations according to the symmetry principle; said relay lens means including a binary optical element including a Fresnel zone plate attached to a lens in said relay means; said binary optical element providing magnifying power in addition to any magnifying power introduced by refraction in the relay lens, the binary optical element also providing chromatic aberration correction; and a detector means for receiving said beam of light after it is refocused by said relay lens means.
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Specification