A rear view mirror that eliminates the dangerous “blind spot” that hurts drivers so much when driving on the roads has just been patented in the United States. It is a slightly curved mirror devised by mathematician Andrew Hicks of Drexel University, which widens the field of view with minimal distortion in the reflected image .
Today’s car side mirrors provide a very accurate sense of how far behind vehicles are, but offer a very narrow field of vision, ranging from 15 to 17 degrees. Professor Hick’s new invention extends it up to 45 degrees , and the most interesting thing is that he achieves it with hardly distorting the shape of objects or altering the perception of distances and sizes. Not surprisingly, the researcher used a mathematical algorithm to precisely define the angle of the reflected light. ? Imagine that the surface of this crystal is made of many small crystals turned at different angles, like a disco ball “, clarifies Hick, who, before patenting the invention, made it known in the magazine Optics Letters . According to the mathematician, the The algorithm manipulates the direction of each face of this “metaphorical sphere” to obtain a larger image without distorting it.
