Biological compound-eye systems have unique advantages in three-dimensional (3D) positioning based on light energy distribution. A curved compound eye was designed and manufactured to imitate a biological compound eye. To overcome the nonuniform off-axis response and enlarge the aperture of the eyelet, a novel dome light cone was designed. The dome light cone was designed as a conical structure, which consisted of a lot of fiber wires with a diameter of 6 μm. Additionally, based on the proposed biological compound-eye systems, an algorithm was proposed to obtain the 3D position of the object by analyzing the light location and intensity distribution. The effect of the illumination intensity, the position of the target’s center, and the non-repeatability were evaluated. The relative standard uncertainty in the 3D position was estimated to be 8.6%. Low uncertainty verified the validity of the 3D localization algorithm.

To achieve a system combining large field of view (FOV), high image quality, high 3D detection accuracy, and high-speed tracking in a close shot, a single-layered compound eye with seven ommatidia is developed. The functional relationship among the FOV, optical axis angle, and overlapping area is established mathematically. Based on the relationship, one center ommatidium and six hexagonally arranged marginal ommatidia with large apertures are set on a spherical substrate to guarantee a large FOV and sufficient overlapping information for 3D imaging. To control the off-axis aberration of the marginal ommatidia, an optical freeform surface is applied. The algorithms of regions of interest and Kalman filter are applied to achieve high-speed capturing. Experiments show that the system can obtain a high-quality image with sufficient overlapping information for 3D tracking in shifting distance.

Micro injection moulding has been demonstrated as one of the most efficient mass production technologies for manufacturing polymeric microfluidic devices, which have been widely used in life sciences, environmental and analytical fields and agro-food industries. However, the filling of micro features for typical microfluidic devices is complicated and not yet fully understood, which consequently restricts the chip development. In the present work, a microfluidic flow cytometer chip with essential high aspect ratio micro features was used as a typical model to study their filling process. Short-shot experiments and single factor experiments were performed to examine the filling progress of such features during the injection and packing stages of the micro injection moulding process. The influence of process parameters such as shot size, packing pressure, packing time and mould temperature were systematically monitored, characterised and correlated with 3D measurements and real response of the machine such as screw velocity and screw position. A combined melt flow and creep deformation model was proposed to explain the complex influence of process on replication. An approach of over-shot micro injection moulding was proposed and was shown to be effective at improving the replication quality of high aspect ratio micro features.