Advanced-UV excimer laser processing

High energy excimer lasers lend maximum flexibility to laser microprocessing, since virtually every material is amenable to accurate, high resolution material ablation without subsequent post treatment. Due to the UV photons provided with no up-conversion required as direct output by excimer lasers, output powers of many hundred watts are easily achievable and are key to high throughput, and up-scaling capability of manufacturing processes. In particular, the large flat-top excimer laser profile is well-suited for most efficient parallel processing of two and three dimensional microstructures. Compact micromachining concepts particularly suited for material ablation and surface activation will be introduced.