Achromatic stigmatism: achromatic Cartesian ovoid.

Abstract

Monochromatic and chromatic aberrations are imaging defects mainly studied from a geometrical optics point of view. These defects are treated through optimization and minimization methods to achieve acceptable performance in optical imaging systems, where the correct choice of glass materials is one of the main challenges. The selection of glass materials is a complex issue that requires a large amount of computing power within sophisticated computational algorithms and enough professional experience in the area. However, in this work, we propose a new methodology to treat the chromatic and geometrical aberrations simultaneously by taking advantage of the relationship between form parameters of Cartesian surfaces and wavelength in the material. From this relationship, we obtain an achromatism principle that establishes the conditions for refracting systems to present a strictly achromatic stigmatism.