Illuminator method and device

Abstract

A first toroidal ray guide defines an axis of revolution and has a toroidal entrance pupil adapted to image light incident on the entrance pupil at an angle to the axis of revolution between 40 and 140 degrees, and it also has a first imaging surface opposite the entrance pupil. A second toroidal ray guide also defines the same axis of revolution and has a second imaging surface adjacent to the first imaging surface. Various additions and further qualities of the ray guides, which form optical channels, are disclosed. In a method light emanating from a source at between 40- 140 degrees from an optical axis is received at an entrance pupil of a ray guide arrangement that is circularly symmetric about the optical axis. Then the received light is redirected through the ray guide arrangement to an exit pupil in an average direction substantially parallel to the optical axis.

Description

technical field [0001] Exemplary and non-limiting embodiments of the invention relate generally to radiation imaging, and more particularly to collection, collimation and convergence of radiation. More specifically, these embodiments relate to specific components of optical systems that capture large angle rays of light onto the system optical axis and collect and redistribute these rays to form illumination-quality images of objects or data. Background technique [0002] How to collect all the light emitted from a particular light source and further shape the beam into a desired form is a known problem. An ideal solution for many applications is to image a light source by emitting light into a hemisphere around the source. The term "imaging" here does not mean forming an image with minimized aberrations, but merely imaging with sufficient illumination quality. [0003] One known approach is to use high NA (numerical aperture) objectives, such as aspheric capture lens syst...

AI Technical Summary

Problems solved by technology

Some of the problems with existing systems known to the inventors in terms of concentration of sunlight are that they cannot concentrate light at near maximum concentration ratios and they are all physically large relative to the energy they deliver

Some renditions also require some optical surfaces to be in the immediate vicinity of where the light converges, this can cause serious problems when using the maximum convergence ratio as the optical surfaces will be affected where the light has very high intensity

Also, for prior art concentrators based on parabolic mirrors, the heating element is located above the parabolic mirror, which is a very difficult physical arrangement

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