Cheap, High Quality Night Vision Coming Soon!
Kevin Bullis writing in Technology Review gives an update on the progress of researchers at MIT in their quest to integrate infrared devices in medical and other non-military applications. 'Fast, high-quality infrared devices are expensive. That's why they've been used mainly in applications such as space imaging and night vision for military helicopter pilots. But now MIT researchers are developing a method for making high-quality infrared devices for one-tenth of the cost, which could eventually lead to widespread use in civilian applications, such as cancer detection and night-vision displays in vehicles.
Relatively low-cost infrared devices are already available to consumers, but these devices are unreliable and tend to produce noisy, low-resolution images that refresh slowly, says Anu Agarwal, a research associate at MIT who manages the infrared project at the institute's Microphotonics Center. High-end devices produce sharp images and video in real time, but need to be cooled with liquid nitrogen, she says, and they're made with expensive materials and specialized tools. '
Read: Technology Review