title: Scalable shape-controlled fabrication of curved microstructures using a femtosecond laser wet-etching process.
abstract: Materials with curvilinear surface microstructures are highly desirable for micro-optical and biomedical devices. However, realization of such devices efficiently remains technically challenging. This paper demonstrates a facile and flexible method to fabricate curvilinear microstructures with controllable shapes and dimensions. The method composes of femtosecond laser exposures and chemical etching process with the hydrofluoric acid solutions. By fixed-point and step-in laser irradiations followed by the chemical treatments, concave microstructures with different profiles such as spherical, conical, bell-like and parabola were fabricated on silica glasses. The convex structures were replicated on polymers by the casting replication process. In this work, we used this technique to fabricate high-quality microlens arrays and high-aspect-ratio microwells which can be used in 3D cell culture. This approach offers several advantages such as high-efficient, scalable shape-controllable and easy manipulations.
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory for Manufacturing System Engineering & Key Laboratory of Photonics Technology for Information of Shaanxi Province, Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an, 710049, PR China.
authors.forename: Hao
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Bian
authors.forename: Qing
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.forename: Feng
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.forename: Hewei
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.forename: Guangqing
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Du
authors.forename: Zefang
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Deng
authors.forename: Jinhai
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Si
authors.forename: Feng
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Yun
authors.forename: Xun
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Hou
mesh_terms: D018929:Cell Culture Techniques; D007834:Lasers; D036103:Nanotechnology / Q000295:instrumentation* / Q000379:methods