New optical polishing techniques for aspherical and free form lenses

To develop and assess new polishing techniques for strong aspheric and free-form lenses 

The mass and the dimensions of optical instruments for space applications can be reduced using free form optics, which provides more flexibility for the optical designer. While manufacturing of spherical and aspherical surfaces can be performed using established technologies, the manufacturing and testing of free-form surfaces poses challenges to polishing companies. In recent years, polishing techniques were developed for free-form mirrors but only to a limited extent for refractive elements.Transferring and developing figuring, polishing and testing techniques for free-form lenses of high quality will enable more compact refractive instruments for Earth observation and science. The activity aims to develop technologies for the figuring and polishing for arbitrarily shaped refractive surfaces (lenses). The development will be driven by the need to achieve a low surface form error, low mid spatial frequency errors and low surface roughness. This activity encompasses the following tasks:- review of available polishing technologies already developed for aspheric components- identification of the best suitable polishing technologies to assess wavefront and scattering performance- manufacturing of breadboard samples- assessment of the manufactured samples in terms of figuring accuracy, scatter performance and manufacturing schedule.