Fabrication of A Micro Elliptical Collimator Lens for A Beam Shape Form of Laser Diode

Abstract

This paper describes a new fabrication process of a micro elliptical collimator lens to form a beam shape for LD (laser diode), and the evaluation results of the optical characteristic for this lens. Beam shape of LD is an ellipse because divergent light angle is different between horizontal and vertical direction, which increases a coupling loss with an optical fiber. In this presentation, we propose the lens to form the divergent light of an elliptical beam shape to the collimated light of a circular beam shape. This lens makes it possible to reduce the coupling loss with the optical fiber. For this purpose, we designed one lens, which has different curvature radiuses between incident and output surfaces. In the incident surface, the divergent light is formed to the convergent light, and in the output surface, the convergent light is formed to the collimated light. We simulated the optical characteristic of this lens, and designed for various parameters. In order to fabricate this lens, we propose a new process using a chemically absorbed monomolecular layer, which has an excellent hydrophobic property. This layer is patterned and deposited by a photolithographic technique. Next, we drop a UV (ultra violet) cure material on the hydrophilic area, as the result, we can fabricate a micro elliptical lens shape. The curvature radius of this lens can be controlled by the amount of a dropped UV cure material and an elliptical pattern size in horizontal and vertical direction. The formed lens shapes are transferred by the electroplating and then the micro dies are fabricated. And they are used for molding the plastic lens