MIT Media Lab researchers have developed a low-cost color holographic video display powered by a $10 optical chip they created. The prototype display can update images fast enough—30 times per second—to make the image look like it is in motion. The device could lead to affordable color holographic-video displays and increase conventional 2D displays’ resolutions. The chip is the least expensive component in the system, but it is not the only newly-devised component. Typically, it is difficult to control the light waves to create a holographic video image. Existing technologies are too expensive and cumbersome. As a solution, the researchers used a lithium niobate crystal, smaller than other materials previously attempted, and a single waveguide for each pixel in their system. The waveguides confine the light traveling through them and each can be located in close proximity to each other. Each waveguide also contains a metal electrode able to create an acoustic wave, which is used to filter light. The images they made refreshed at a rate of five frames per second and were 420 × 420 pixels. The researchers published their findings in Nature. (Mashable)(Discovery News)(MIT)(Nature)
