New products improving night vision goggles for troops.

• Author: Magnuson, Stew

* The mantra in the world of night vision technology has always been to reduce the size and weight and power consumption of the devices worn in the field.

Researchers are making inroads solving those problems and more, as they not only make goggles, gun sights and monoculars lighter, but work to improve the users' visual range.

"We think size, weight and power will always be on the roadmap as to where night vision is going but where we really start to see benefits creep in is when we mirror human biology as closely as possible," said Aaron Cole, a scientist at the Naval Surface Warfare Center's Crane Division in Indiana.

Cole began with an idea in 2008 to double the standard military night vision goggle's field of view from 40 degrees to 80 degrees, which is much closer to what humans see. The goal was to reduce the so-called "soda straw" views seen in current devices.

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"With the narrow 40-degree soda straw view, you really have to move your head left and right. You have no depth perception. You can't do basic things like stick a hypodermic needle in your buddy's arm, cut a wire if you're trying to disarm a bomb or notice basic things like a change in elevation when you're running around," said Cole in an interview.

It's not only about seeing more, he explained. Humans rely on secondary cues in order to determine where they are in space. And these secondary cues come from the periphery of one's vision. Looking straight ahead, everything is in focus. But a hand grasping a tool coming from the blurrier side view, either right or left, helps the brain to guide it.

"What we really wanted to do was copy the human eye as best as possible to give the user the most familiar reference point when using a night vision goggle," he said.

Crane took Cole's idea and set him up with Kent Electronics Corp. of Sugar Land, Texas, which won a small business innovation research contract to help flesh out the idea. Together, they took the idea from a technology readiness level 1 to TRL 9 in six years, meaning the new "wide field of view night vision goggle" is now ready to be fielded in large quantities.

The "secret sauce" that Cole came up with to earn him a co-patent on the technology was curving the image a certain way as it entered the image tube and curving it again as it leaves.

After transitioning the goggle to a rapid innovation contract, officials decided the best course was to retrofit existing night vision systems rather than starting from scratch with an all-new device. It took standard PVS-15 goggles, replaced the lenses, and...