360° endoscopy using panomorph lens technology

Minimally invasive surgical procedures or examinations require increasingly sophisticated devices to explore the interior of the patient's body. The new generation of medical scopes takes advantage of the recent progresses in optic miniaturization and high resolution imaging sensors (1.3MP). Even with such high resolution, the endoscopic vision remains quite different than human vision, especially regarding the field of view. Several optical systems have been developed to meet large field of view requirements. However most of these optical systems suffer from low resolution or poor quality. This paper presents the results of our investigation of a new innovative approach based on a wide angle panomorph lens designed for endoscopes and its dedicated visualisation software. This lens is based on human vision which increases the resolution in the field of view of interest to meet the image quality requirement specific to endoscopic applications. We show how the wide angle field of view, augmented resolution, close focus and distortion-free multi-visualisation software can improve laparoscopic and other endoscopic procedures.

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