Sony Unveils the Smallest and Lightest Lidar Depth Sensor

Summary

Sony announced the AS-DT1, the world’s smallest and lightest miniature precision LiDAR depth sensor. Measuring a mere 29 by 29 by 31 millimeters (1.14 by 1.14 by 1.22 inches) excluding protrusions, the Sony AS-DT1 LiDAR Depth Sensor relies upon sophisticated miniaturization and optical lens technologies from Sony’s machine vision industrial cameras to accurately measure distance and range. The device utilizes “Direct Time of Flight” (dToF) LiDAR technology and features a Sony Single Photon Avalanche Diode (SPAD) image sensor. As Sony Semiconductor Solutions Corporation describes, a SPAD sensor promises exceptional photon detection efficiency, ensuring the sensor can detect even very weak photons emitted from the light source and reflected off an object. This efficiency is crucial, as reflected light is precisely how LiDAR works. Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) measures distances by measuring the time it takes for emitted photons to bounce off an object and return to the sensor. The more efficient the image sensor in terms of photon efficiency, the better its accuracy. Compared to the CMOS image sensors that photographers are familiar with, which detect light by measuring the volume of light that accumulates inside individual pixels over a specified time frame, SPAD sensors can detect a single photon — SPAD sensors digitally count photon particles without accuracy or noise issues. SPAD image sensors are fundamentally different and significantly more efficient than CMOS sensors. So why don’t all cameras use SPAD sensors? While they are very good at measuring single photons, they are not well-suited to measuring much more light, which nearly everyone wants to capture with a traditional camera. They are also costly, not high resolution, and inflexible. It was big news when Canon unveiled a one-megapixel SPAD sensor less than five years ago, to help illustrate where the technology is in terms of resolution. Sony does not say much about the specific SPAD sensor in its...