Advanced laser processing of glass materials

Three kinds of advanced technologies using lasers for glass microprocessing are reviewed. Simultaneous irradiation of vacuum ultraviolet (VUV) laser beam, which possesses extremely small laser fluence, with ultraviolet (UV) laser achieves enhanced high surface and edge quality ablation in fused silica and other hard materials with little debris deposition as well as high-speed and high-efficiency refractive index modification of fused silica (VUV-UV multiwavelength excitation processing). Metal plasma generated by the laser beam effectively assists high-quality ablation of transparent materials, resulting in surface microstructuring, high-speed holes drilling, crack-free marking, color marking, painting and metal interconnection for the various kinds of glass materials (laser-induced plasma-assisted ablation (LIPAA)). In the meanwhile, a nature of multiphoton absorption of femtosecond laser by transparent materials realizes fabrication of true three-dimensional microstructures embedded in photosensitive glass.