IEEE PHOTONICS TECHNOLOGY LETTERS, VOL. 35, NO.
13, 1 JULY 2023
Femtosecond Laser Fabrication of SiC Microlens
Arrays as Integrated Light Homogenizer and Splitter
Jia-Xin Zheng , Ming-Rui Guo , Mei-Ling Luan , Bao-Xu Wang , Hua Fan,
Ai-Wu Li , and Xue-Qing Liu , Member, IEEE
Abstract— Silicon carbide (SiC) plays a vital role in special
optics because of its stable physicochemical and excellent optical
properties; however, making the fabrication of SiC considerably
more difficult. In this study, femtosecond laser-assisted induc-
tively coupled plasma etching (ICP) technology is proposed to
achieve the efficient fabrication of large-area microlens arrays on
the surface of silicon carbide. As an illustration, the microlens
array was used for high-quality beam homogenization (unifor-
mity is up to 90%) of the transmitted and reflected Gaussian light
beams with a wavelength of 532 nm. The beam-splitting ratio can
be dy-namically adjusted (from 1.2 to 3.2) by controlling the angle
of the incident light, indicating that the SiC microlens arrays can
act as an integrated optical homogenizer and beam splitter. This
method demonstrates the broad application prospects of SiC in
miniaturized and integrated special optics and provides new ideas
for further applications of SiC in integrated optical systems.
Index Terms— Femtosecond laser processing, silicon carbide,
dry-assisted etching, microlens arrays.
I. I NTRODUCTION
S ILICON carbide (SiC), which is a widely used third-
generation semiconductor, has potential applications in
optoelectronics and high-power electronics owing to its excel-
lent properties such as high breakdown voltage and high
mechanical and temperature stability [1], [2], [3]. Particularly,
SiC is suitable for optical applications in harsh environmental
conditions, including strong radiation and high temperature
and pressure, owing to its high transmittance from visible to
near-infrared wavelengths and high optical damage threshold
[4], [5], [6]. For example, SiC ceramic materials have been
widely used in aerospace scanning mirrors, reflectors, and
optical systems [7], [8], [9].
However, these properties make it more difficult to fabricate
SiC microstructures. Thus far, various technologies have been
Manuscript received 1 February 2023; revised 13 April 2023; accepted
4 May 2023. Date of publication 8 May 2023; date of current version
22 May 2023. This work was supported in part by the National Natural
Science Foundation of China under Grant 61960206003, Grant 62105117,
Grant 62175086, and Grant 62131018; and in part by the Major Science
and Technology Projects in Jilin Province under Grant 20220301003GX.
(Corresponding author: Xue-Qing Liu.)
Jia-Xin Zheng, Ming-Rui Guo, Mei-Ling Luan, Bao-Xu Wang, Ai-Wu Li,
and Xue-Qing Liu are with the State Key Laboratory on Integrated Opto-
electronics, College of Electronic Science and Engineering, Jilin Univer-
sity, Changchun 130012, China (e-mail: zhengjx19@163.com; guomr99@
126.com; luanml2022@163.com; bxwang_sklio@jlu.edu.cn; liaw@jlu.edu.cn;
liuxueqing@jlu.edu.cn).
Hua Fan is with the State Key Laboratory of Precision Measure-
ment Technology and Instruments, Department of Precision Instrument,
Tsinghua University, Haidian, Beijing 100084, China (e-mail: fanh_2020@
tsinghua.org.cn).
Color versions of one or more figures in this letter are available at
https://doi.org/10.1109/LPT.2023.3274353.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/LPT.2023.3274353
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705
proposed for processing hard materials, including photolithog-
raphy [10], focused ion beam etching [11], electron beam
etching [12], and diamond turning [13]. Among them, the
diamond-turning method has low machining accuracy, which
is unsuitable for high-precision fabrication. The rest of the
methods can achieve nanometer-level fabrication accuracy.
However, the fabrication process is inefficient and is used
for two-dimensional structure fabrication. Femtosecond laser
processing technology [14], [15], [16], [17], [18] can achieve
high-precision and complex three-dimensional structure fab-
rication compared with the above methods. However, high-
energy laser ablation of the material often results in a rough
surface structure, making it difficult to meet optical require-
ments. To solve this problem, a femtosecond laser-assisted
etching technology is proposed, which can achieve highly
smooth micro-optical component fabrication by combining
it with subsequent etching [19]. However, the wet-etching
process of SiC crystals tends to be anisotropic. The etching
rate varied for the different crystal orientations. Moreover, the
material is prone to corrosion pits, which affect the surface
quality [20]. The fabrication of complex micro-nano silicon
carbide structures with high precision and surface quality
remains a significant challenge.
In this study, femtosecond laser-assisted inductively coupled
plasma etching (ICP) technology is proposed to achieve the
efficient fabrication of large-area SiC microlens arrays. The
surface of the SiC was modified using a femtosecond laser,
and the modified area was subsequently etched out of the
lens structure using inductively coupled plasma etching. The
etched microlenses had good morphology and high surface
quality. Simultaneously, the size of individual lenses can be
adjusted by regulating the degree of laser modification of the
material. Finally, large-area rapid fabrication of a high-surface-
quality silicon carbide microlens array is realized. A microlens
array was used for high-quality beam homogenization of
the transmitted and reflected Gaussian light beams with a
wavelength of 532 nm. The uniformity of the spot reached
92%. The beam-splitting ratio can be dynamically adjusted
from 1.2 to 3.2 by controlling the angle of the incident light.
II. E XPERIMENTAL S ETUP
In the experiment, the SiC surface (4H-SiC, 500µm thick,
Synlight Crystal) was first wiped several times with acetone
and ethanol. Subsequently, the sample was sonicated in deion-
ized water for 5 min to obtain a clean silicon carbide surface.
The laser source was a femtosecond laser with a repetition
rate of 200 kHz, pulse width of 280 fs, and wavelength of
1030 nm (Light Conversion Pharos). The laser was focused
using an objective lens with a magnification of 40× and
a numerical aperture of 0.6 to achieve higher precision.
706
Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of the fabrication process.
Fig. 2. Relationship between laser power (a) and number of pulses (b) on
the depth and diameter of the microlens.
A three-dimensional motion stage (Newport, the stroke of
the x- and y-axes is 5 cm, the stroke along the z-axis is
5 mm, and the accuracy is 100 nm) was used to fabricate
the surface microstructure of SiC. After femtosecond laser
irradiation, the surface of silicon carbide formed a laser-
modified area. The physicochemical properties of the modified
area changed. Then, the SiC sample was etched by SF6 and O2
in an inductively coupled plasma etching system (TAILONG
ELECTRONICS, ICP-100A) with gas flow rates of 100 and
20 sccm, respectively. The samples were processed at an
antenna RF power and bias RF power of 500 and 200 W
for 5h. The subsequent ICP etching is in two stages. During
the initial etching stage, the laser-modified region is quickly
removed and formed concave structures. Subsequently, the
concave structures expanded along with etching time in the
stable etching stage. Finally, SiC microlens arrays with smooth
surfaces were obtained through dry etching, as shown in Fig. 1.
III. R ESULTS AND D ISCUSSION
The degree of modification determines the dry etching rate
of the laser-irradiated area. Achieving areas with different
degrees of modification is possible by adjusting the laser
power and number of laser pulses. The morphologies of the
microlenses were characterized using different laser parame-
ters. The relationship between the depth and diameter of the
SiC microlenses was obtained for different laser powers and
numbers of laser pulses, as shown in Fig. 2(a). The depth
and diameter of the SiC concave microlens showed a gradual
in-crease as the femtosecond laser power increased. Higher
energy causes greater damage to the single crystal structure of
SiC, resulting in larger modified areas that are easier to etch
[21], [22].
Therefore, the dry etching rate was accelerated, and the
size of the silicon carbide microlens increased. The depth and
diameter of the SiC microlens gradually increased and then
decreased as the number of laser pulses increased, as shown
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IEEE PHOTONICS TECHNOLOGY LETTERS, VOL. 35, NO. 13, 1 JULY 2023
Fig. 3. SEM image of the large area (a) and the local enlargement (b) SiC
microlens array. (c) The three-dimensional morphology of microlens array,
(d) focusing performance of microlens array, (e) cross-sectional data of
microlens array, and (f) AFM image of the microlens array.
in Fig. 2(b). The surface modification of the SiC increased as
the number of pulses increased when the number of pulses
was low. The depth and diameter of the etched microlens
were also increased. As the number of laser pulses is fur-
ther increased, the SiC surface is oxidized to form a mask,
inhibiting the etching process. The depth and diameter of the
SiC microlens were gradually reduced. Therefore, a shape-
controlled microlens array can be fabricated by controlling
laser fabrication parameters.
Based on the above conclusions, we fabricated a 1 × 1 cm
large-area SiC microlens arrays with a period of 10µm dense
stacking arrangement. Through scanning electron microscopy
(SEM) (Figs. 3(a), (b)), a three-dimensional pattern of confocal
microscopy (Fig. 3(c)) and a cross-sectional view of this
structure (Fig. 3(e)) can be observed. This approach enables
the fabrication of large-area silicon carbide microlens arrays
with a good surface morphology. Furthermore, we tested
the focusing performance of the SiC microlens array by the
white LED point light source and atomic force microscopy
(AFM), as shown in Figs. 3(d) and (f), respectively. Inter-
cepting a 1 µm × 1 µm square centered on the bottom
of the microlens to characterize the roughness Rq results in
5 nm. The microlens arrays were found to have good optical
properties and high surface quality. This is crucial for the
subsequent homogenization and beam-splitting applications of
silicon carbide microlens arrays.
Microlens arrays [23], which have the advantages of having
a small size, light weight, easy integration, and greater versa-
tility, are used for beam homogenization. Homogenizers are
used together with beam splitters. The use of beam splitters
allows the high-power laser beam to be split into multiple
low-power laser beams and allows larger areas to be processed
simultaneously. However, as laser power increases, the optics
of many integrated systems cannot withstand the high laser
power. Integrated optics with high damage thresholds are
ideal for high-power industrial systems and applications [24],
ZHENG et al.: FEMTOSECOND LASER FABRICATION OF SiC MICROLENS ARRAYS
Fig. 4. (a) Experimental system for beam homogenization and splitting of SiC
microlens arrays. The spot diagram, 3D intensity distribution, and intensity
cross-section of the incident light (b)-(d), the transmitted (e)-(g), and reflected
(h)-(j) homogenized beam at the incident angle of 45◦ .
[25], [26]. Silicon carbide, which can withstand high-power
lasers, is a promising material for the fabrication of these
devices. A microlens array was used for high-quality beam
homogenization of the transmitted and reflected Gaussian light
beams.
The beam homogenization and beam splitting effects were
tested using a self-built test system. The light beam sequen-
tially passed through the SiC sample and the Fourier lens
(focal length is 100 mm, F) to reach the print letter, where
it was finally collected by the CCD. Beam homogenization
of the microlens array consisted of two steps. The first is
cutting the light field by silicon carbide with a uniformly
arranged microlens array, and the second is resuperpositioning
the cut light field using a Fourier lens. The wavefront of
the incident beam is split into a number of small waves as
light passes through the array of microlenses. Every focus of
these microlenses (focal length, f) continued to propagate as
a separate light source. The transmitted and reflected light
are the concave imaginary and convex real focal points of
the microlens respectively. The distance from the Fresnel
lens is thus F - f and F + f. Subsequently, these wavelets
pass through a Fourier lens and are superimposed on the
screen. The distance of the camera from the Fresnel lens is F.
A homogenized beam with uniform light intensity was formed.
The homogenized beam of the reflected and transmitted light
was simultaneously obtained using a CCD detector, as shown
in Fig. 4(a). In the experiments, we selected a laser with
a wavelength of 532 nm as the incident light source. The
light was incident on the silicon carbide sample to obtain
transmission and reflection homogenized beams. The homoge-
nized light intensity distribution was obtained by extracting the
picture light intensity data. Spot homogeneity can be analyzed
by calculating the root mean square error (RMS) and spot
uniformity (ξ ), which are expressed as
v
u N
uX 2 simulated values because of the absorption and scattering of
RMS = t (I j − I¯) /N (1)
j we tested the incident, transmitted, and reflected homogenized
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707
Fig. 5. Angular dependence of SiC lens arrays. (a) Simulated results
of sample transmittance versus incident angle and wavelength. (b) Angular
resolution spectrometer test results. (c) Comparison of experimental and
simulated data at a wavelength of 532 nm. (d) Angular variation curves of
transmitted and reflected homogenized beams.
ξ = (1 − R M S) × 100% (2)
where I¯ is the average energy of the homogenized spot, I j
is the energy of each point of the homogenized spot, N is
the number of sampling points, and ξ is the spot uniformity.
This method has statistical properties and is generally used
to evaluate the spot uniformity. In the experiment, the spot
uniformity is obtained by calculating the intensity distribution
of the homogenized spot. After homogenization of the SiC
lens array, the calculated spot uniformity reached 92%, which
achieved good homogenization performance. Figs. 4(b)-(j)
show the transmission and reflection of the homogenized beam
from the SiC microlens array at an incident angle of 45◦ .
The optical photograph of the incident spot (Fig. 4(b)), three-
dimensional intensity map (Fig. 4(c)), and cross-sectional data
(Fig. 4(d)) show that the intensity distribution of the incident
beam is not uniform and exhibit a Gaussian distribution.
After passing through the SiC microlens array, the trans-
mission (Figs. 4(e)-(g)) and reflection (Figs. 4(h)-(j)) beams
were homogenized with a more uniform spot. Meanwhile,
a transmission to reflection-homogenized beams ratio of 2:1
was achieved at 45◦ .
Furthermore, the silicon carbide microlens array can also be
used as a beam splitter. And the beam splitting ratio can be
adjusted by adjusting the angle of the incident light. Fig. 5(a)
shows the simulated results (by COMSOL Multiphysics) of
sample transmittance versus incident angle and wavelength.
The transmittance of light passing through the sample gradu-
ally decreased as the angle gradually increased. Moreover, the
transmittance gradually increased as the wavelength increased,
which was determined by the dispersion properties of SiC.
Then, the angular-resolution spectrometer was used to measure
the transmission spectrum of the sample as a function of angle
(Fig. 5(b)), and the results were consistent with the simulation
data. Comparing the experimental and simulated results at
532 nm in the actual experiment, the trends are the same
(Fig. 5(c)). The transmittance values were smaller than the
the structured sample during the actual measurement. Finally,
708
beams at different angles using a beam homogenization and
splitting system. The intensity distribution was extracted and
the actual transmittance and reflectance were calculated to
produce an angle-dependent curve, as shown in Fig. 5(d).
As the angle increased, the transmittance became progressively
weaker, and the reflectance became progressively stronger. The
results are the same for clockwise and counterclockwise rota-
tions, indicating that the actual homogenized beam-splitting
measurement results are the same as the simulated and spec-
troscopic results. The beam splitting ratio of the microlens as a
beam splitter can be obtained by comparing the transmittance
and reflectance in Fig. 5(d). The beam-splitting ratio can be
dynamically adjusted from 1.2 to 3.2 by controlling the angle
of the incident light.
IV. C ONCLUSION
We proposed a femtosecond laser-assisted inductively cou-
pled plasma etching technique for the rapid fabrication of
high-quality and large-area SiC microlens arrays. The rela-
tionship between the laser power and number of pulses on
the depth and diameter of the etched microlenses was inves-
tigated. We determined that the depth and diameter of the
microlens gradually increased with the laser power. The size
of the microlens gradually increased as the number of laser
pulses increased. The SiC surface was oxidized to form a
mask as the number of laser pulses was further increased,
inhibiting the etching process. In addition, the size of the SiC
microlens de-creased. A large-area silicon carbide microlens
array was used as an integrated homogenizer and beam splitter
to simultaneously homogenize the transmitted and reflected
beams. The uniformity of the homogenized spot was 92%.
The beam-splitting ratio can be dynamically adjusted from
1.2 to 3.2 by controlling the angle of the incident light. This
method demonstrates the broad application prospects of SiC
in miniaturized and integrated special optics and provides
new ideas for further applications of SiC in integrated optical
systems.
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