  We propose a high-performance glass-plastic hybrid minimalist aspheric
panoramic annular lens (ASPAL) to solve several major limitations of the
traditional panoramic annular lens (PAL), such as large size, high weight, and
complex system. The field of view (FoV) of the ASPAL is
360{\deg}x(35{\deg}~110{\deg}) and the imaging quality is close to the
diffraction limit. This large FoV ASPAL is composed of only 4 lenses. Moreover,
we establish a physical structure model of PAL using the ray tracing method and
study the influence of its physical parameters on compactness ratio. In
addition, for the evaluation of local tolerances of annular surfaces, we
propose a tolerance analysis method suitable for ASPAL. This analytical method
can effectively analyze surface irregularities on annular surfaces and provide
clear guidance on manufacturing tolerances for ASPAL. Benefiting from
high-precision glass molding and injection molding aspheric lens manufacturing
techniques, we finally manufactured 20 ASPALs in small batches. The weight of
an ASPAL prototype is only 8.5 g. Our framework provides promising insights for
the application of panoramic systems in space and weight-constrained
environmental sensing scenarios such as intelligent security, micro-UAVs, and
micro-robots.
