Compact Single‐Shot Incoherent Edge Detection With a Polarization‐Multiplexed Metalens

ABSTRACT Edge detection under incoherent illumination is highly desirable for compact vision systems but remains challenging due to the lack of phase control and the difficulty of implementing high‐pass filtering in intensity‐based imaging. Here, we propose and experimentally demonstrate a polarization‐sensitive metalens that enables single‐shot incoherent edge detection by constructing a second‐order high‐pass optical transfer function (OTF). The metalens imparts distinct phase profiles to left‐ and right‐handed circularly polarized components, producing a pair of spatially separated images that encode complementary object information. Through digital alignment and subtraction, an effective OTF proportional to is realized, leading to robust edge enhancement, while requiring only simple pixel‐wise operations. We experimentally validate this approach using USAF resolution targets and further demonstrate a compact imaging module by directly integrating the metalens with a Complementary Metal‐Oxide‐Semiconductor (CMOS) sensor, enabling real‐scene single‐shot operation. This work establishes a practical optical preprocessing strategy for incoherent edge detection, providing a pathway toward miniaturized, low‐power, and computation‐efficient vision front‐ends for machine vision, autonomous sensing, and portable imaging systems.