Lasers make lasers
Femtosecond lasers have, over the past two decades, proven to be unique instruments for high precision micro-manufacturing. Their capability for very precise ablation of minute amounts of matter without any thermal interaction has opened new applications, and they are now essential tools for eye surgery clinics, display and semi-conductor facilities, or high-end watchmakers.
Yet, this industrial revolution has had so far little consequence on the way laser makers make their lasers.
This is about to change with unexpected and innovative use of femtosecond lasers for glass processing.
Using a selective, very precise micro-etching process, exquisite 3D features can now be created inside glass, and open the way to the realization of high quality glass components, which could not be manufactured in any other way.
3D micro-manufacturing in glass - Courtesy FEMTOprint
With the availability of very high repetition rate femtosecond lasers, micro-welding of glass on glass, glass on metal, glass on ceramic, can now be achieved.
Welding of Glass and Sapphire on Copper and Invar - Courtesy NASA
By creating nano-structures within a glass volume or at its surface, exquisite aesthetics or functional properties can be conferred to optical components.
Tailoring mechanical properties of Glass - Courtesy Galatea Lab, EPFL
Amplitude has teamed with FEMTOprint, a Swiss company specialized in 3D glass microdevices, and the Galatea laboratory of the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, to apply these new technologies to the manufacturing of the laser itself.
Within the framework of the H2020 European Union research program, the Cryocool Eureka-Eurostars project will develop new manufacturing processes for critical optical components of femtosecond lasers, starting with an efficient, small, all-glass heat dissipation device for high power lasers.
Other components, making use of glass-welding, glass 3D-printing and surface texturing are expected to follow within the next few years, bringing to the market a new generation of femtosecond lasers.
For to forge iron a hammer is needed; and, to have a hammer, it must be made; for this, another hammer is needed.
Baruch Spinoza