Plastic micro-optical components with the LIGA technology

Moulding of plastics enables optical features to be integrated into a single unit. This is particularly an advantage for product designs that impose space and weight constraints. Therefore, the use of plastic for biomedical and non telecommunications orientated optical applications continues to grow as design engineers take advantage of the ease of fabrication and the material flexibility. Deep X-ray LIGA presents itself as a method ideally suited for the production of moulds for the manufacture of plastic microcomponents. LIGA is synonymous for the lithography preferably carried out with synchrotron radiation X-rays, although many other lithography and non-lithography methods for master production have been developed in the last few years. Nevertheless, the exceptional resist heights, the enormous accuracy and low runout as well as the low sidewall roughnesses cannot be copied by these other methods of master production. In particular, the low sidewall roughnesses achieved through deep X-ray LIGA is essential for the manufacture of waveguide coupling systems based on polymers. The design and conceptualisation of such waveguides systems is presented here. In addition however, the exceptional resist heights and low runout can be employed to produce passive structures for the packaging of optical components. This paper provides an overview of the deep X-ray LIGA technology, emphasizing its strengths and application areas. Considerations for the design and manufacture of the plastic structures are also elucidated.