December 2021
Spotlight Summary by Sebastian Simeth and Martin Reininghaus
Few pulses femtosecond laser exposure for high efficiency 3D glass micromachining
New manufacturing technologies are capable of generating arbitrary shapes and high-aspect-ratios, including undercuts or even in-volume fluidic channel structures at high μm-precision. Amongst other approaches, 3D micromachining of transparent glass compounds using femtosecond laser inscription and subsequent wet chemical etching is one of these novel manufacturing technologies. For example, this method opens completely new manufacturing capabilities for complex new optics or highly integrated temperature resistant workpieces and enables completely new applications in the consumer or electronics sector.
Casamenti et al. present the pathway towards an elaborated 3D glass micromachining method by demonstrating improved aspect ratios, a higher process efficiency and faster processing times. Therefore, the authors identify key parameters in both the laser inscription and chemical etching process and investigate their correlation. By changing the exposure dose and the polarization of the femtosecond laser radiation, different regimes in the process windows are identified. The variation between a hydrofluoric-acid based and two hydroxide-based etchants reveals different etching mechanisms. Subsequent annealing after the laser inscription reveals thermal relaxation affecting the etching mechanism. The investigations executed reveal deeper insights into the selective laser-induced etching process (SLE) upon the influence of laser-induced defects in the glass matrix on the etching selectivity.
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Casamenti et al. present the pathway towards an elaborated 3D glass micromachining method by demonstrating improved aspect ratios, a higher process efficiency and faster processing times. Therefore, the authors identify key parameters in both the laser inscription and chemical etching process and investigate their correlation. By changing the exposure dose and the polarization of the femtosecond laser radiation, different regimes in the process windows are identified. The variation between a hydrofluoric-acid based and two hydroxide-based etchants reveals different etching mechanisms. Subsequent annealing after the laser inscription reveals thermal relaxation affecting the etching mechanism. The investigations executed reveal deeper insights into the selective laser-induced etching process (SLE) upon the influence of laser-induced defects in the glass matrix on the etching selectivity.
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Article Information
Few pulses femtosecond laser exposure for high efficiency 3D glass micromachining
Enrico Casamenti, Sacha Pollonghini, and Yves Bellouard
Opt. Express 29(22) 35054-35066 (2021) View: Abstract | HTML | PDF