Laser-assisted fabrication of monomode polymer waveguides and their optical characterization

✍ Scribed by W. Pfleging; S. Finke; E. Gaganidze; K. Litfin; L. Steinbock; R. Heidinger

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 2003
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 924 KB
• Volume: 34
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0933-5137
• DOI: 10.1002/mawe.200300676

✦ Synopsis

Abstract

The local surface modification as well as the direct micro‐ablation of polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) with UV‐laser radiation was studied with respect to the fabrication of optical monomode waveguides. Different UV sources were applied with a focus on excimer lasers and frequency‐multiplied Nd:YAG lasers to investigate several concepts of integrated waveguides. One type of waveguides is realized by localized physical modification, which leads in one step to an integrated polymer waveguide with higher refractive index. A complementary type of waveguides includes the formation of small grooves, which are filled with index matched materials introducing a micro‐scaled increase or decrease of the refractive index into the original PMMA substrate. The different laser‐assisted fabrication techniques for polymer waveguide formation as well as the characterization of their local optical properties are discussed in detail.