The Conectus Satt (Société d'Accélération du Transfert de Technologies) and the German company Optronis GmbH have signed an exclusive license for the worldwide exploitation of the innovative Solid State Streak Camera technology developed by the ICube2 laboratory in Alsace. The result is a new ultra-fast camera, the only one of its kind in the world according to its designers, dedicated to research and industry. The first model will be available to researchers and engineers from August 2020.
An ultra-fast camera ("Streak Camera") is a precision technical instrument for analyzing and optimizing phenomena invisible to the human eye. This type of camera is mainly used in industry, science and research.
While the technology is tried and tested, the camera models currently on the market have certain limitations. For many applications, they are still particularly fragile and cumbersome, and require a very substantial purchase price (€100k on average).
In this context, the new S3C-1 camera offers a new alternative.
A breakthrough innovation
The new S3C-1 camera provides solutions to the constraints of current cameras. Technically, it's the first Solid State Streak Camera (S3C) architecture fully integrated in CMOS 3 technology: the camera no longer requires a high-speed rotating mirror or a light-amplifying vacuum tube," say its designers. It is significantly more compact (a 12 cm cube / existing cameras being the size of a cupboard), lighter (2 kg instead of more than 20 kg) and more robust (perfectly resistant to shocks or intense light, which facilitates its use in extreme technological contexts)."
The performance of the S3C-1 camera is first-rate, and its temporal definition is close to the nanosecond (see data sheet in appendix). What's more, the S3C-1 camera offers a novel feature: it can record continuously, making it possible to record after an event has occurred (very useful for events whose exact triggering time is unknown, for example in research and test experiments). Instantaneous image acquisition throughput exceeds 1 terabyte/second.
This camera should benefit all industrial players in the pharmaceutical, chemical, defense, nuclear, micromechanical and pulsed laser process sectors.
An innovation born at the heart of public research in Alsace
The groundbreaking S3C-1 camera technology is the fruit of the scientific excellence of the ICube Laboratory and one of its teams, headed by Wilfried Uhring. This laboratory has been working for many years with the German company Optronis to refine and develop this breakthrough technology. In 2011, their research results were recognized by the INSIS 4 Institute of the CNRS.
Progress multiplies until the crucial prototype stage. This is where Satt Conectus comes in. Caroline Dreyer, its president, explains what's at stake: "After studying the economic potential of this nascent technology, Conectus decided in 2017 to provide the missing boost: to invest financially to produce the functional prototype of the sensor, the heart of the S3C-1 camera, thus taking a major step towards industrialization. Optronis, for its part, focused on electronic, software and design developments, to design the complete camera. Today, we've come full circle: we've collectively transformed an invention born of academic research into a product that's actually on the market. That's what we're all about!
Michel de Mathelin, Director of the ICube Laboratory, adds: "For over 30 years, the ICube laboratory's Heterogeneous Systems and Microsystems (HSM) team has been designing ultra-fast imaging systems, specializing in slit-scan imaging, which is 100 to 1000 times faster than conventional optical imaging. The extreme performance of these systems has been used extensively for medical imaging research in the laboratory. The original idea of transposing this imaging technique to CMOS technology came to the ICube laboratory in 1999. This new approach makes it possible to integrate virtually all the functions of the ultra-fast camera into an integrated circuit chip using technology similar to that used in smartphone photo sensors. This makes it a compact, reliable, easy-to-produce and potentially low-cost camera, while offering additional features such as anti-glare and post-triggering. It took 20 years of research to get to an industrial product with world-leading performance."
Dr. Patrick Summ, Managing Director of Optronis, concludes: "Optronis, a major player in streak cameras, has set itself the task of developing and industrializing S3C technology. Thanks to Satt Conectus, we were able to jointly develop this new camera, and Optronis was able to position itself to acquire an exclusive worldwide operating license. We're building on a solid foundation, as the technology has already been patented by Conectus. This camera offers an unprecedented innovation that should appeal to all those working on the study of fast physical phenomena. Our ambition is to be able to offer this worldwide innovation at an attractive price. For us, it's fundamental to democratize access to innovation, and make it available to as many industrial players as possible.
Visit the site:
optronis.com