Land engineering

The Xenos peckii is a tiny fly that actually lives on wasps.

What makes them special is that each of their eyes is made up of 50 separate lenses.

This means that they see 50 different pictures at once, and these are then all put together in the brain to make up one big panoramic picture of what they are looking at.

How our engineers were inspired by the fly

Soldiers often have to work at night, and the engineers at BAE Systems were looking for ways to help them see more in the dark.

They were really interested by the fact that bugs can see so many different pictures, despite their eyes being so small. So, they decided to copy the Xenos peckii's eyes and make their own camera to help soldiers see more at night.

What they developed

The BAE Systems engineers created a camera with nine lenses, each about the size of a mobile phone camera lens.

This device was small and light enough to fit onto a soldier's helmet and allowed them to see more at night than ever before. It gave them a 60 degree field of vision, compared with their previous equipment that only gave them 30–40 degrees of field vision.

Because they copied the way that a bug's eye works, they called this new development ‘bug eye’ technology.

How ‘bug eye’ technology is being used for other military purposes

‘Bug eye’ technology is being used for missile tracking systems. New cameras are smaller and can see a lot more than previous cameras, without having to be moved from side to side.

How ‘bug eye’ technology can be used in everyday life

As well as being used in CCTV cameras to improve security, surgeons are also looking at how it could help them with operations. However, at the moment they have not yet developed a camera small enough to do this.

The Xenos peckii is a tiny parasitic fly which lives on wasps. What makes them so special is that each of their eyes is made up of 50 separate lenses, each producing an individual image. These then combine to form a single large panoramic image in its brain.

How our engineers were inspired by the fly

Soldiers often carry out manoeuvers at night, and the engineers at BAE Systems were looking at ways to help them see better in the dark.

They were fascinated by the fact that some bugs have eyes made up of hundreds of thousands of lenses, and that such a complex optical imaging system could be so small.

They decided to use the Xenos peckii's eyes as a model for a new imaging device.

What they developed

The BAE Systems engineers created a device made up of nine lenses - each about the size of a mobile phone camera lens - arranged on a curved surface.

The camera - which was small and light enough to fit onto a soldier's helmet - gave them a 60 degree field of vision, compared with previous equipment that only offered 30-40 degrees of field vision.

This gave the soldiers much more manoeuvrability and situational awareness during night time missions.

And because they copied the way that a bug’s eye works, they called this new development ‘bug eye’ technology.

How ‘bug eye’ technology is being used for other military purposes

The 'bug eye' system is being developed for missile tracking systems. Existing missile guidance devices only offer about a 20 degree field of vision, which means that the camera has to be attached to a mechanical mount and swivelled around to scan wide areas.

The new technology offers a 120 degree field of vision. This also means there is no need for accompanying hardware, which reduces size, weight and maintenance costs.

How ‘bug eye’ technology can be used in everyday life

This new technology could help to improve security in public places by developing CCTV cameras that could survey panoramas of crowded spaces without any of the usual black spots associated with such systems.

Because there are multiple lenses, they can also zoom in on certain areas of a scene without affecting the rest of the image on the screen.

In medicine it could also be used for keyhole surgery, but with the current device only small enough to fit in the palm of a hand, it will need to be shrunk in size before it find its way into the operating theatre.

The Xenos peckii is a tiny parasitic fly which lives on wasps. What makes them so special is that each of their eyes is made up of 50 separate lenses, each producing an individual image. These then combine to form a single large panoramic image in its brain.

How our engineers were inspired by the fly

Soldiers often carry out manoeuvers at night, and the engineers at BAE Systems were looking at ways to help them see better in the dark.

They were fascinated by the fact that some bugs have eyes made up of hundreds of thousands of lenses, and that such a complex optical imaging system could be so small.

They decided that the Xenos peckii was the fly that they would use as a model for a new imaging device.

What they developed

The BAE Systems engineers created a device made up of nine lenses - each about the size of a mobile phone camera lens - arranged on a curved surface.

The device - which was small and light enough to fit onto a soldier's helmet - gave them a 60 degree field of vision, compared with their previous equipment that only offered 30-40 degrees of field vision.

This gave the soldiers much more manoeuvrability and situational awareness during night time missions.

And because they copied the way that a bug's eye works, they called this new development ‘bug eye’ technology.

How ‘bug eye’ technology is being used for other military purposes

The 'bug eye' system is being developed for missile tracking systems. Existing missile guidance devices only offer about a 20 degree field of vision, which means that the camera has to be attached to a mechanical mount and swivelled around to scan wide areas.

The new technology offers a 120 degree field of vision. This also means there is no need for accompanying hardware, which reduces size, weight and maintenance costs.

How ‘bug eye’ technology can be used in everyday life

This new technology could help to improve security in public places by developing CCTV cameras that could survey panoramas of crowded spaces without any of the usual black spots associated with such systems.

Because there are multiple lenses, they can also zoom in on certain areas of a scene without affecting the rest of the image on the screen.

In medicine it could also be used for keyhole surgery, but with the current device only small enough to fit in the palm of a hand, it will need to be shrunk in size before it find its way into the operating theatre.