Photon Sieve: Research Progress and Applications Prospects in Space

Photon sieve is a new type diffractive optical element based on Fresnel zone plate. Compared with Fresnel zone plate, photon sieve can increase the signal-to-noise ratio of imaging system and improve image quality, can have super resolution smaller than its feature size.Photon sieve can also have a wider imaging spectra range compared with traditional refractive and reflective optical devices. These advantages allow photon sieve to have important application prospect in the field of space imaging optics. In this paper, the development of computational theory and method, configuration design, fabrication technology and application of photon sieve were introduced, and large scale application prospect of photon sieve in space was forecasted.