Depth sensing and facial recognition with metasurface and PCSEL integration

Wen-Cheng Hsu^1,2, Chia-Hsun Chang¹, Yu-Heng Hong², Hao-Chung Kuo^1,2, Yao-Wei Huang^1*

¹Department of Photonics, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Hsinchu, Taiwan
²Semiconductor Research Center, Hon Hai Research Institute, Taipei, Taiwan

* Presenter:Yao-Wei Huang, email:ywh@nycu.edu.tw

We present a novel depth sensing system for facial recognition applying metasurfaces and photonic crystal surface-emitting lasers (PCSELs). Our lens-free, single-shot system projects 45,700 infrared dots from a compact 297² μm² sample area, offering a wide 158° field-of-view (FOV) with low power consumption. Compared to traditional dot projectors, our design is 233 times smaller and consumes 5-10 times less power due to PCSELs. The GaAs-based meta-hologram and simple optical architecture make it lighter and more energy-efficient, suitable for wearable devices. This technology overcomes limitations of bulky dot projectors, paving the way for integration into compact wearable devices.

Keywords: Metasurfaces, Photonic-crystal surface-emitting laser, Structured light, Depth sensing