I would imagine that some of the first applications of the 'superlens', constructed from metamaterials with a negative refractive index, will be for microlenses in imaging devices. Often when we think no further progress is possible because we've hit the barrier of the so-called laws of physics, some imaginative breakthrough turns up to circumvent that apparent obstacle.
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Ray,
A little knowledge can be dangerous.
Current superlenses consist mainly of wires and split-ring resonators (SRRs), which work for radio waves, but constructing a super lens at optical wave lenghts is difficult since not only must the index of refraction equal -1, but also requires that both ε (electrical permittivity) = -1 and µ (magnetic permeability) = -1. A lens that falls short of this ideal suffers from drastically degraded resolution. (THE QUEST FOR THE Superlens., By: Pendry, John B., Smith, David R., Scientific American, 00368733, Jul2006, Vol. 295, Issue 1).
If the object distance is very close to the image distance, these conditions can be relaxed, and a very thin layer of metal can act as a superlens, possibly useful for micro lithography in constructing semiconductor chips, but this wouldn't work for a camera lens.
We are a long way from a super lens for cameras, but perhaps someday such a lens can be constructed. I would not expect it before the next PMA show.
Bill