One of the important challenges for the deployment of the emerging breed of nanotechnology components is
interfacing them with the external world, preferably accomplished with low-cost micro-optical devices. For the
fabrication of this kind of micro-optical modules, we make use of deep proton writing (DPW) as a generic rapid
prototyping technology. DPW consists of bombarding polymer samples with swift protons, which results after
chemical processing steps in high quality micro-optical components. The strength of the DPW micro-machining
technology is the ability to fabricate monolithic building blocks that include micro-optical and mechanical functionalities
which can be precisely integrated into more complex photonic systems.
In this paper we give an overview of the process steps of the technology and we present several examples
of micro-optical and micro-mechanical components, fabricated through DPW, targeting applications in optical
interconnections and in bio-photonics. These include: high-precision 2-D fiber connectors, out-of-plane coupling
structures featuring high-quality 45° and curved micro-mirrors, arrays of high aspect ratio micro-pillars, and
fluorescence and absorption detection bio-photonics modules.
While DPW is clearly not a mass fabrication technique as such, one of its assets is that once the master component
has been prototyped, a metal mould can be generated from the DPW master by applying electroplating.
After removal of the plastic master, this metal mould can be used as a shim in a final microinjection moulding
or hot embossing step. This way, the master component can be mass-produced at low cost in a wide variety of
high-tech plastics.
Professional societies sponsor student chapters in order to foster scholarship and training in photonics at the college and graduate level, but they are also an excellent resource for disseminating photonics knowledge to pre-college students and teachers. Starting in 2006, we tracked the involvement of SPIE student chapter volunteers in informal pre-college education settings. Chapter students reached 2800, 4900 and 11800 pre-college students respectively from 2006-2008 with some form of informal instruction in optics and photonics. As a case study, the EduKit, a self-contained instruction module featuring refractive and diffractive micro-optics developed by the European Network of Excellence on Micro-Optics (NEMO), was disseminated through student chapters in Argentina, Belgium, Canada, China, Colombia, India, Latvia, Mexico, Peru, Russia, Singapore, South Africa, and the United States. We tracked the movement of this material through the network, up to the student-teacher feedback stage. The student chapter network provided rapid dissemination of the material, translation of the material into the local language, and leveraged existing chapter contacts in schools to provide an audience. We describe the student chapter network and its impact on the development of the EduKit teaching module.
The integration of optical components on microfluidic devices is needed for downscaling analytical processes to portable, integrated and low-cost lab-on-a-chip systems for point-of-care applications. We have developed a micro-optical detection unit for both laser induced fluorescence and absorbance analysis in fused silica capillaries for microfluidic chromatographic applications. We present the use of non-sequential ray tracing simulations to design the system and to perform a tolerance analysis to define theoretically for each parameter in the system the acceptable fabrication and alignment errors. The system is prototyped using Deep Proton Writing and characterized by means of an optical non-contact profiler, in order to check for every parameter if the realized alignment and fabrication errors do not exceed the theoretically acceptable tolerance ranges. These measurements show that Deep Proton Writing is appropriate for the fabrication of the designed micro-optical detection system. In addition the tolerance study shows for which parameters the alignment is most critical. Finally we demonstrate by means of optical simulations that the same micro-optical design can be applied in different materials (index of refraction between 1.3 and 1.5) and used for sensing fluorescence of a variety of molecules in a wide spectral window (from 400nm up to 1550nm).
We present a micro-optical detection unit for both laser induced fluorescence and absorbance analysis in fused
silica capillaries, which can be used for chromatographic applications. The detection system is designed by
means of non-sequential ray tracing simulations and prototyped by means of Deep Proton Writing. Such a
prototyped master component is afterwards replicated by means of elastomeric moulding and vacuum casting.
In a proof-of-concept demonstration the prototyped master
micro-optical unit is used for the detection of various
concentrations of coumarin dyes. The detection limit (SNR=3.3) achieved measures 0.6nM for fluorescence
analysis and 12μM for absorbance measurements in capillaries with an inner diameter of 150μm. We discuss the
optimization of different measurement parameters of the detectors in the setup in order to achieve accurate, fast
and sensitive measurements.
One of the remaining challenges to solve the interconnection bottlenecks at the Printed Circuit Board (PCB) and Multi-Chip-Module (MCM) level, is to adequately replace the galvanic interconnects with high-performance, low-cost, compact and reliable micro-photonic alternatives. At our labs of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel we are therefore optimizing and deploying a rapid micro-optical prototyping technology for micro-optical interconnect modules, which we call Deep Proton Writing (DPW). An advantage of the DPW process is that it can create steep micro-optical surfaces, micro-holes, micro-lenses and alignment features in one irradation step. Hence, relative accuracies are very well controlled. In this report, we will address more specifically the following components, made each with the DPW technology: 1) out-of-plane couplers for optical wave-guides embedded in PCB, 2) peripheral fiber ribbons and two dimensional single- and multimode fiber connectors for high-speed parallel optical connections, and 3) intra-MCM level optical interconnections via free-space optical modules. We will give special attention to the optical tolerancing and the opto-mechanical integration of components in their packages. We use both a sensitivity analysis to misalignment errors and Monte-Carlo simulations. It is our aim to investigate the whole component integration chain from the optoelectronic device packaging to the micro-opto-mechanical assembly of the interconnect module.
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