title: Direct Laser Printing of Tailored Polymeric Microlenses.
abstract: We report a laser-based approach for the fast fabrication of high-optical-quality polymeric microlenses and microlens arrays with controllable geometry and size. Our strategy consists of the direct laser printing of microdroplets of a highly viscous UV prepolymer at targeted positions, followed by photocuring. We study the morphological characteristics and imaging performance of the microlenses as a function of the substrate and laser parameters and investigate optimal printing conditions and printing mechanisms. We show that the microlens size and focusing properties can be easily tuned by the laser pulse energy, with minimum volumes below 20 fL and focal lengths ranging from 7 to 50 μm.
authors.affiliation: Departament de Física Aplicada, Universitat de Barcelona , Martí i Franqués 1, 08028 Barcelona, Spain.
authors.forename: Camilo
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Florian
authors.affiliation: Nanophysics, Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia , Via Morego 30, 16163 Genoa, Italy.
authors.forename: Simonluca
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Piazza
authors.affiliation: Nanophysics, Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia , Via Morego 30, 16163 Genoa, Italy.
authors.forename: Alberto
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Diaspro
authors.affiliation: Departament de Física Aplicada, Universitat de Barcelona , Martí i Franqués 1, 08028 Barcelona, Spain.
authors.forename: Pere
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Serra
authors.affiliation: Nanophysics, Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia , Via Morego 30, 16163 Genoa, Italy.
authors.forename: Martí
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Duocastella
keywords: laser direct write; laser-induced forward transfer; microlenses; microscopy; photopolymerization