China develops the world's most powerful spy camera?

A team of scientists from the Aerospace Information Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Sciences has achieved a leap in optical imaging technology with a powerful laser that could redefine global standards for surveillance, the South China Morning Post reported on February 20.

The technology could potentially allow China to monitor foreign military satellites with unparalleled precision or distinguish minute details like human faces from low Earth orbit.

Photo: SCMP screenshot

The team captured images with a camera, with millimeter-level resolution, from a distance of more than 100 kilometers, something previously thought impossible. The new breakthrough was described in a study published in the Chinese journal Laser last week.

The experiment was conducted on Qinghai Lake, a vast body of alpine water in remote northwest China, and the team deployed an advanced synthetic aperture lidar system, a type of laser-based imaging system with a wide field of view.

Located on the north shore of Qinghai Lake, the camera aimed at reflective prism arrays placed 101.8 km away in clear atmospheric conditions with high visibility, minimal cloud cover and steady winds.

The camera can quickly detect details as small as 1.7 mm and tell the distance to objects with an accuracy of 15.6 mm, a level of detail 100 times better than today's best spy cameras and the best telescopes based on traditional lenses.

The Chinese team used a number of technological innovations to achieve this groundbreaking technological advance. By splitting the laser beam across a 4x4 microlens array, they expanded the system’s optical aperture from 17.2 mm to 68.8 mm, overcoming the usual trade-off between aperture size and field of view.

The team also used a specialized laser module to send signals with frequencies exceeding 10 gigahertz. This provided good range resolution, allowing for precise distance measurements, according to the South China Morming Post .