Professor Daniele Faccio from Edinburgh's School of Engineering and Physical Sciences, Photonics and Quantum Sciences told academic journal Nature Photonics that the camera can log the position of a photon in a 32 by 32 grid at 20 billion frames per second.
Incredible spy camera that can see AROUND CORNERS ruins hide and seek for everyone: https://t.co/QM9YT40vPS pic.twitter.com/cWdnYRWstP
— GoExplore.net (@GoExploreNet) December 9, 2015
The team have built upon previous research to create a slow-motion film of a laser beam in flight — but this new development means that they can now use lasers to detect hidden moving objects.
'Terry' the human, which is actually a 30-centimeter high foam model used in the experiment, hid around a corner waiting for a scientist to shoot a laser beam at the floor close-by.
When the light hits the ground, photons, which are the basic unit that makes up all light, bounce off and produce a spherical 'echo', containing few light particles allowing the super camera to see them. When the echo travels around the corner and hits the hidden object another echo is produced allowing some of the light to be picked up by the camera around a corner.
Every movement Terry makes, changes the echo and by keeping track of those changes, the camera can work out Terry's exact position. This technology, according to the scientists, has the potential to be used in search and rescue operations or in cars, to avoid accidents from incoming cars.
"Most people were trying to reconstruct in 3D, but we were trying to track. We developed new algorithms to be able to achieve this, and achieve it fast," study co-author Genevieve Garipey explained.
So fast in fact, that it only takes a second for the super camera to record information and track any movement. The next step for the scientists in Scotland is to spot Terry in normal light — not just in the dark.
