Polycarbonate lenses have a higher index of refraction (1.586) than CR-39 plastic (1.498) and are therefore thinner in an equal lens prescription.  With a higher index (of refraction), light is bent more efficiently, therefore it requires less material to achieve the eyeglass prescription making the lenses much lighter.  Another significant advantage of these lenses is that they are impact resistant.  Polycarbonate lenses offer up to 10 times more impact resistance than regular plastic lenses, hence along with Trivex, are the lenses of choice for safety glasses, children’s eyewear, and for anyone who wants durable yet thin lenses.  It's important to recognize that impact resistant does not mean shatterproof.  They can still break, therefore official safety glasses should be worn for eye-hazardous jobs and sports.  Additionally, Trivex and polycarbonate naturally block most UV light (385 nanometers and below) and do not need the application of a UV coating.    They are also lab favorites for use in rimless frames, because polycarbonate lenses can be easily drilled and resist cracking around the drill holes.   A disadvantage of polycarbonate is that it is naturally a soft material causing it to scratch much easier.  However, unlike CR-39 basic plastic lenses, a scratch resistant coating is almost always standard as it is applied when the lenses are made.  With higher refractive indexes, there are often more chromatic aberrations, meaning visual disturbances of light, that can be interpreted as blur by some.  Chromatic aberrations are higher in polycarbonate lenses.  The abbe value of polycarbonate is 30, the lowest of all lens materials making it the worst lens for optical clarity and integrity.  Plenty of people cannot adapt to a polycarbonate lens.  For those reasons Trivex is the better choice in a mid-index lens.

Automate 2024floor plan

DISCLAIMER: The information on this website is for educational purposes only. The information on this website is not meant to diagnose or treat any disease(s). Only a licensed doctor can diagnose or treat disease. No information on this website has been evaluated by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

The refractive index of any substance is the speed of light in that substance compared to the speed of light in a vacuum expressed as a ratio.  Light travels fastest in a vacuum and slower through different materials.

Glass lenses provide excellent optics, the most scratch resistant lens material and blocks UV light.  However, glass lenses are heavy, thick and dangerous if broken  and cannot be used in certain frame styles.  Some glass is available with a refractive index as high as 1.8 and 1.9.

NVIDIA’s robotics solutions provide tools to develop and deploy AI-powered robots, drones, and autonomous machines. From hardware solutions on NVIDIA Jetson™ to software solutions on NVIDIA Isaac™, NVIDIA’s end-to-end robotics platform lets you deploy AI-enabled robots quickly and efficiently.

Because of the density of the high index plastic material it isn’t usually the lightest material even though it is thinner.  Trivex is usually the lightest weight lens material.

Automate2025

Visit us at the Automate event to learn how NVIDIA’s AI platforms for manufacturing, robotics, and logistics are improving efficiency, scalability, and production across multiple industries. Be sure to attend our transformative panel discussions and education sessions.

Automate 2024Exhibitor List

Abbe value is a measure of the lens material’s dispersion of light.  A lens with a low Abbe value causes a higher dispersion and leads to unwanted chromatic aberration.  Chromatic aberration is a distortion of the image due to the inability of the lens to focus all colors onto the same focal point.  This leads to the perception of undesirable color fringes when viewing objects for many people.

High index plastics do offer good ultraviolet inhibition (below 380-400 nanometers) properties as well as shatter resistance.

Georgia Olympia Brikis, Director of Physics-Informed AI Research, Siemens Gerard Andrews, Product Marketing, Robotics, NVIDIA Holger Kenn, Director of Business Strategy, AI, Data, and Emerging Technology, Microsoft Corp. Paul Thomas, Director of Machine Vision and Applied AI in Global Engineering, P&G Rashmi Misra, Chief AI Officer, Analog Devices

High index lenses offer a thinner lens but usually have lower abbe values.  The Abbe value determines to a large part the optical integrity of the lens. The higher the abbe value the better the optical clarity and less distortion.   It is a delicate balance to find a lens that not only satisfies in terms of aesthetics and weight, but also features acceptable optical clarity.

Automate 2024schedule

The robotics platform is adding new foundation models, a robot learning framework, and tools for AI workflow orchestration and robot perception.

Explore how large language models, advanced simulations, and other evolving artificial intelligence technologies are changing the face of manufacturing and industrial production. Join Gerard Andrews alongside a panel of experts as they discuss how AI can streamline operations, enhance efficiency, and drive innovation in your operations.

AutomateDetroit2024

As the world’s most advanced platform for generative AI, NVIDIA AI is designed to meet your application and business needs. With innovations at every layer of the stack—including accelerated computing, essential AI software, and AI foundries—you can build, customize, and deploy generative AI models for any application, anywhere.

An option with high index lenses is an "aspheric" design, which can contribute to a thinner lens appearance and profile.   Aspheric means that instead of having a round, or spherical curve on the front surface, the curve gradually changes from the center of the lens to the periphery of the lens.  The curvature in a minus lens will get gradually steeper toward the periphery and a plus lens curvature will gradually flatten toward the periphery.  This is important because it provides consistent optical clarity in the lens periphery, not just the center.  It also makes it possible for someone with a strong prescription to wear a larger selection of frames without worry of the lenses being too thick.  This not only affects the appearance of the lens but also reduces the enlarged appearance of eyes ("bug-eyed" look) with high plus power prescriptions that are used for farsightedness.  The opposite occurs in high minus power lenses for nearsightedness.  In non-aspheric lenses, eyes can appear minified, although the effect is not as dramatic as it is for farsighted people.  Aspheric lenses do help reduce this effect.  Aspheric lenses are also available in lower index plastics but are more common in high index, because high index is so often chosen for very high prescriptions.   The aspheric design itself produces a thinner lens.

Automate 2024app

Trivex along with polycarbonate is great for rimless frames and those frames requiring drill mount screws through the lenses.

There's much more to buying a new pair of eyeglasses than just selecting the perfect frame.  There are many different lens materials, lens coatings, tints, etc. and it can sometimes feel overwhelming.  Understanding the different lens options available can make the process much less stressful.  This information will explain the basic types of lens materials available and the most common lens options.

A lens with a higher index of refraction tends to reflect light more than standard CR-39 plastic or glass lenses.  The extra reflections are usually quite bothersome for the wearer especially at night and while using a computer monitor.  The glare from the lenses is also cosmetically unappealing.  Because of this most high index lenses come with an anti-reflective coating as a standard option.

CR-39 lenses have a high Abbe value of 59.3 making them the lenses with the least distortion from dispersion/chromatic aberration.

The higher the index of refraction the thinner a lens can be to get the same refraction effect.  Optical lenses are now classified into the following categories:

The refractive index of a basic plastic lens (CR-39) is 1.498 meaning that light travels 1.498 times faster in a vacuum than it does through the plastic lens.

Automate 2024Chicago

Trivex is a relatively new optical lens material.  It has the ultraviolet blocking properties (380 nanometers and less) and shatter resistant properties of polycarbonate. However, Trivex lenses have a much higher abbe value (43-45) vs. polycarbonate (abbe value 30) making it much better in optical clarity with fewer chromatic aberrations.  Trivex also has a slightly lower density so it is lighter than polycarbonate.  In fact, Trivex is the lightest weight lens material available.  Another advantage that Trivex has over polycarbonate is that it can be easily tinted.

An even higher index lens should be considered to achieve the thinnest lenses possible.  This means the index of refraction would need to be greater than that of polycarbonate and Trivex (>1.60).  High index lenses are classified by numbers that represent their refractive index and range from 1.64 to 1.74.  High index lenses can be up to 50% thinner than regular glass or plastic lenses, and they’re usually much lighter, too.  Although these lenses are generally recommended for people with high optical prescriptions, high index lenses can benefit anyone who would like a thinner lens profile.  The higher the index, the thinner the lens will be relative to basic plastic.  One of the biggest disadvantages of high index materials is the higher cost compared to other materials including polycarbonate and Trivex.  High index plastics also have a lower abbe value (32-42) and therefore have some problems with chromatic abberations.  Because of the way that light interacts with high index lenses (chromatic aberrations), it's highly recommended that an anti-reflective (AR) coating also be applied to the lens to help with reflected light.

It is a simple law of physics.  The smaller the lens the lighter and thinner it is.  Choosing a small lens size frame is the biggest determinant of lens thickness and weight!  Smaller frames also decrease the amount of lens distortions/aberrations.

Modern applications are transforming every business, from data analytics for better business forecasting, to AI for autonomous vehicles, to advanced visualization for medical diagnosis. NVIDIA accelerated computing platforms provide the infrastructure to power these applications, no matter where they’re run.

Automate 2024location

These are conventional plastic material lenses with a refractive index of 1.498 that have been widely used since their introduction in 1947.  One of the biggest advantages of this lens is its affordability.  It also provides good optical clarity and is easy to tint.  Some disadvantages of this material are that it scratches easy, does not provide adequate UV protection, is not as impact resistant as other lenses and is also heavier and thicker than the higher index plastics.  It should be noted however, that a scratch resistance coat, as well as a UV coating can be applied to the lens helping to reduce some of these deficiencies. CR-39 plastic lens material is usually only recommended for those with a weak prescription where lens thickness and weight are not a concern and for dress eyewear in which safety is not an issue.

Alphabet’s Intrinsic robotics unit is adopting NVIDIA AI and Isaac platform technologies to advance the complex field of autonomous robotic manipulation, showcasing leaps in robotic grasping and industrial scalability assisted by foundation models enabled by NVIDIA Isaac Manipulator.

With NVIDIA Omniverse Enterprise deployed on NVIDIA OVX™, developers are building applications to power physically based, AI-enabled digital twins. They now have the superpowers to design, simulate, and optimize products, equipment, and processes in real time before going to production.

NVIDIA Omniverse, Metropolis, Isaac, and cuOpt™ together offer an “AI gym” in which users can train AI agents to help robots and humans sync with their environment to navigate unpredictable or complex events in industrial spaces.

A workflow using Isaac Manipulator can generate grasp poses and robot motions, first evaluating them in Isaac Sim, and then executing them in the real world with the Intrinsic platform, and visualizing the process in Flowstate.

In the United States, most high index lenses are made from the various plastic materials.  Some other countries still use a lot of glass material for high index lenses.  Glass is available in very high indices such as 1.8 and 1.9 but because of its density it is still very heavy.  Glass lenses also take longer for optical labs to fabricate.  High index plastic lenses can be used in desired rimless and 3 piece mount frames.

AI’s transformative power is paving the way for manufacturers to extend their capabilities in visual object inspection, on-floor activity monitoring, work cell design validation, and 3D perception for mobile robots. In this session, Erin Rapacki will provide actionable insights into deploying new AI tools for the next iteration of manufacturing automation. Learn how NVIDIA Omniverse™, NVIDIA Metropolis, and the NVIDIA Isaac™ robotics platform enable AI training, testing, and advanced applications in manufacturing facilities.

NVIDIA Omniverse Cloud will be available as APIs, extending the reach of the world’s leading platform for creating industrial digital twins across the entire ecosystem of software makers.