A laser surface sculpting technique, which uses a commercial nanosecond UV laser at 355nm to drive a highly localised melting and melt flow process, is demonstrated for the production of reflective 2D diffractive optical structures on martensitic stainless steel and nickel samples. It is shown that this laser-texturing process can be used to generate 10×10µm² pixels with depths ranging from 150nm to 500nm. Either single or multiple pulses are used to generate each feature via hydrodynamic surface melt deformations, dependent on the dimensions of the features required, material properties, and the laser parameters. To demonstrate the viability of the process for the generation of 2D diffractive structures, it was used to create 2D matrices on mechanically polished stainless steel samples. The diffraction efficiency of these samples is measured and compared with a Fraunhofer diffraction model.

1.
M.T.
Gale
,
Replication techniques for diffractive optical elements
,
Journal Microelectronic Engineering-Special issue on microfabrication of diffractive optical elements Vol
34
, Issue
3-4
, Feb. 1,
1997
-Pages
321
339
2.
A.
Ellin
and
J.
Henshaw
,
Method and apparatus for scale manufacture without substantial removal material
.
2006
, Patent WO/2006/120440 Renishaw plc.
3.
A method of forming optical device, International Publical Number WO 2012/038707 A1.
4.
S.
Giet
paper [submitted]
5.
J.
Qi
,
K.L.
Wang
, and
Y.M.
Zhu
,
A study of on the laser marking process of stainless steel.
Journal of Materials Processing Technology
,
2003
.
139
: p.
273
276
.
6.
N.
Pierron
,
P.
Sallamand
, and
S.
Mattei
,
Numerical modeling of molten pool formation during an interaction of a pulsed laser (Nd:YAG) with an aluminium sheet.
Proceedindgs of the COMSOL Multiphysics User’s conference 2005
,
2005
.
7.
J.M.
Jouvard
,
A.
Soveja
, and
N.
Pierron
,
Thermal modeling of metal surface texturing by pulsed laser.
Proceedindgs of the COMSOL Multiphysics User’s conference 2006
,
2006
.
8.
S.
lu
,
H.
Fujii
, and
K.
Nogi
,
Marangoni convection and weld shape variations in Ar-O2 and Ar-CO2 shielded GTA welding.
Materials science and engineering A
,
2004
(
380
): p.
290
297
.
9.
R.
Schuster
and
M.
Dinkelmann
.
Observation of evaporating surfaces and vapour flows at capillary geometries
. in
Conference on Lasers in Manufacturing
.
2009
.
Munich
.
10.
E.
Nagels
,
J.R.
Dufloub
, and
J.
Van Humbeecka
,
The influence of sulphur content on the quality of laser cutting of steel.
Journal of Materials Processing Technology
,
2007
.
194
: p.
159
162
.
11.
S.
Giet
,
A.
Ellin
,
C.
Michakis
,
J.
Parry
,
M.
Kidd
,
J.D.
Shephard
,
D. P.
Hand
, and
N.
Weston
,
Novel laser-based machining process for high precision optical position encoders.
Pro 5th Int. WLT Conf on Lasers in Manufacturing-2009
,
2009
.
This content is only available via PDF.
You do not currently have access to this content.