In an advance that could lead to cameras with features such as infinite depth of field, wider view angle, low aberrations, and vastly increased pixel density, flexible optoelectronics pioneer Zhenqiang (Jack) Ma has devised a method for making curved digital image sensors in shapes that mimic the convex features of an insect’s compound eye and a mammal’s concave “pinhole” eye.

To create the curved photodetector, Ma and his students formed pixels by mapping repeating geometric shapes — somewhat like a soccer ball — onto a thin, flat flexible sheet of silicon called a nanomembrane, which sits on a flexible substrate. Then, they used a laser to cut away some of those pixels so the remaining silicon formed perfect, gapless seams when they placed it atop a dome shape (for a convex detector) or into a bowl shape (for a concave detector).