Diamond Micro-Optics

We have developed a method for fabricating almost any type of optical surfaces in diamond. The method consists of the following steps: First, a polymer film, spun onto diamond substrates of optical quality, is patterned by lithographic processes. Next, the surface relief is transferred into the underlying diamond by use of inductively coupled plasma dry etching in an oxygen/argon chemistry. Using this technique, we have successfully demonstrated the fabrication of diamond spherical microlenses, blazed gratings, Fresnel lenses, subwavelength gratings and diffractive fan-out elements. The spherical microlenses had apertures of 90 m and f-number of 4. The phase error, measured with a Twyman-Green interferometer at 633 nm, was found to be less than 31 nm. The diffraction efficiency for the blazed grating was measured to be 68% at 400 nm, with a theoretical maximum of 71%. The subwavelength grating was designed for reducing surface reflections at a wavelength of 10.6 m. Spectrophotometric results show that the optical transmission was increased from 70%, using a non-structured diamond substrate, to 97%, using our subwavelength structured diamond. Finally, the fan-out element has been tested with a 6 kW carbondioxide laser, to microstructure pieces of PMMA. The results are excellent, showing diffraction limited spots.