Microstructuring Glasses Using Lasers

The interaction between a laser beam and a material is determined by the wavelength emitted by the laser, its fluence or energy density ε_L and whether or not the laser emits continuous (cw) or pulsed beams, the pulse duration, repetition rate and pulse energy and also of course by the material's properties, such as its absorption characteristics, which is governed by the physical material parameters and structure (bindings) of the material. The lasers tabulated in Table 8.1 are most commonly used to process glasses.

CO₂ and excimer lasers are the prefered lasers used for glass processing. The Nd:YAG lasers are used only for special cases, because of the low absorption of the emitted wavelength by common trade glasses [76]. Frequency converted Nd:YAG lasers emitting at wavelengths of 532 and 266 nm are also used in glass processing [241, 576]. In recent years short pulse lasers emitting laser pulses in the range of femtoseconds found applications in glass processing [384, 504, 534, 568].

Lasers are used to polish, cut, etch, inscribe, decorate and engrave glasses, and also to find applications in microstructuring of glasses. In the context of the book the application of lasers for microstructuring of glasses is of most interest and, therefore, the other processes will only be briefly discussed.