Streamlined Direct Image Transmission via Plastic Optical Fiber for Automotive Applications

As automotive safety systems advance, the number of in-vehicle cameras continues to increase, placing a growing burden on their integration. Simple low-cost methods for acquiring scene images are thus required. Direct image transmission via a single multimode fiber is a candidate for next-generation automotive image networks. Most conventional approaches rely on complex and fragile optics and laser sources, which are undesirable for automotive use. We propose a streamlined and fully passive architecture that relies solely on lenses, a plastic optical fiber (POF), an image sensor, and an image reconstruction network, and show that this method enables simultaneous multi-directional scene acquisition with a single sensor. We systematically evaluate image reconstruction performance under a variety of real-world automotive conditions. Color image transmission through POFs of various lengths (0.1 to 10 m) is demonstrated. High robustness against bending (2 to 10 cm radius), twisting (1 to 4 turns), and temperature variations (15 to 45 °C) is shown. These findings offer key insights toward real-world implementation of streamlined POF-based direct image transmission in automotive applications and other fields.