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There is now a CONTENT FREEZE for Mercury while we switch to a new platform. It began on Friday, March 10 at 6pm and will end on Wednesday, March 15 at noon. No new content can be created during this time, but all material in the system as of the beginning of the freeze will be migrated to the new platform, including users and groups. Functionally the new site is identical to the old one. webteam@gatech.edu
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The Optec WS-Flex USP uses a femto-second laser to process practically any material through ultra-short laser pulses photo-ablation. The ultra-short laser pulse is effective on polymers, metal, ceramics, glass, single crystals, and polymorphic crystals. Materials are ionized by the laser pulse and removed from the surface in a plasma cloud, leaving a clean surface at the interaction site. Contrary to typicaly thermal laser operations, the femto-second laser is not as sensitive to wavelength absorption and therefore offers minimum thermal, creating a no heat affected zone on the part.
The Optec system has 2 cutting heads, a fixed spot 6um head and a galvo-scanning 15um spot head. With a scanning area of 50mmX50mm, the Optec software allows coordinated moves between the galvo head and the stage to create patterns that are uninterrupted over the entire stage area. This will be ideal for microfluidics and photonics applications as well as material thinning and layer removal. The scan head allows for high speed patterns for photovoltaics and battery electrode modifications. The system allow material surface modifications to increase both hydroscopic and hydrophilic characteristics.
Flavien Liegeois from Optic will discuss athermal processing using the Optec WS-Flex, followed by a show and tell with the newly installed system in Lab 160.
