Bright IDEAS Award: Optical strategies for the manufacture of photonic materials

新的光子结构，如光子晶体和超材料，正在引发一场革命，改变我们对控制、操纵和使用光的思考方式。这种材料可以在亚微米/纳米尺度上使用3D结构制造。这种规模的大多数传统制造方法都是二维的，因此不适合3D材料的有效构建。然而，使用非线性激光诱导的光学过程可以创建亚微米级3D分辨率的结构，因为制造效果仅限于激光聚焦，而不是沿着光束扩散。然而，有一些限制阻碍了这些技术进一步发展成为可行的工业过程。一个问题是，随着人们对3D材料的深入关注，制造的分辨率和效率会下降——这限制了目前可实现的设备厚度。另一个限制是速度-现有的过程通常很慢，受到系统的光学设计的限制，串行逐点制造。在这个项目中，我们将开发和应用基于可变形镜和液晶器件的主动和自适应光学技术，以克服这些限制，使3D光学加工作为一种制造技术更有效。

Novel photonic structures, such as photonic crystals and metamaterials, are causing a revolution in the way in which we think about controlling, manipulating and using light. Such materials can be manufactured using 3D structuring on the sub-micron/nanometre scale. Most conventional methods of fabrication on this scale are two-dimensional, so are not suited for the efficient construction of 3D materials. However, using non-linear laser-induced optical processes one can create structures with sub-micron 3D resolution as the fabrication effects are confined to the laser focus, rather than being spread out along the beam. There are however limitations that obstruct the further development of such techniques into a viable industrial process. One issue is the loss of resolution and effectiveness of fabrication as one focuses deeper into a 3D material - this limits the currently achievable device thickness. Another limitation is speed - existing processes are often slow, being constrained by the optical design of the systems to serial point-by-point fabrication. In this project, we will develop and apply active and adaptive optical techniques, based around deformable mirror and liquid crystal devices, to overcome these limitations and make 3D optical processing more effective as a manufacturing technology.