Future Illumination Optics

Light by Design

Developing physical models, new optical components, characterisation methods and advanced simulation tools for illumination devices.

Light by Design

LED is the new standard in lighting. However, lighting devices based on LED require an optical system to create a desired light output. In the program ’Light by Design’ we investigate advanced physical models describing the interaction of light with optical systems and develop efficient numerical simulation methods for the design of these systems. The ultimate goal is to develop advanced simulation tools that can be used for virtual prototyping.

Research tracks

The ILI researchers who are participating at the Light by Design program are mainly part of the Computational Illumination Optics group of the department of M&Cs. It is one of the few mathematics groups worldwide working on optical design problems from illumination optics. It has 3 research tracks: freeform design, improved direct methods and imaging optics.

For more information, please visit the website of the research group Computational Illumination Optics at TU/e

TRACK 1: FREEFORM DESIGN

The goal in freeform design is to compute the shapes of optical surfaces (reflector/lens) that convert a given source distribution, typically LED, into a desired target distribution. The surfaces are referred to as freeform since they do not have any symmetries. The governing equation for these problems is a fully nonlinear PDE of Monge-Ampère type.

TRACK 2: IMPROVED DIRECT METHODS

Direct methods, such as ray tracing, compute the target distribution given the source distribution and the layout of the optical system. These methods must be embedded in an iterative procedure to compute the final design and are based on Monte-Carlo simulation. They are known to have slow convergence. Using the Hamiltonian structure of the system and advanced numerical schemes for PDEs, we are working on more efficient and accurate methods.

TRACK 3: IMAGING OPTICS

The third research track is imaging, where the goal is to form a very precise image of an object, minimizing aberrations. Light propagation is described in terms of Lie transformations.

Using numerical simulation methods, we can compute the shape of the reflector that converts a uniform parallel beam of light into the illuminance pattern corresponding to the grey-scale image of the painting ”Girl with a Pearl Earring”.

Key publications

Anthonissen, M. J. H., Romijn, L. B., ten Thije Boonkkamp, J. H. M., & IJzerman, W. L. (2021). Unified mathematical framework for a class of fundamental freeform optical systems. Optics Express, 29(20), 31650-31664. https://doi.org/10.1364/OE.438920. (track 1)

van Gestel, R. A. M., Anthonissen, M. J. H., ten Thije Boonkkamp, J. H. M., & IJzerman, W. L. (2021). An energy conservative hp-method for Liouville’s equation of geometrical optics. Journal of Scientific Computing, 89, [27]. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10915-021-01612-x. (track 2)

Barion, A., Anthonissen, M. J. H., ten Thije Boonkkamp, J. H. M., & IJzerman, W. L. (2022). Alternative computation of the Seidel aberration coefficients using the Lie algebraic method. Journal of the Optical Society of America A, Optics, Image Science and Vision, 39(9), 1603-1615. https://doi.org/10.1364/JOSAA.465900 (track 3)