Dec 8 2010
Sensofar has introduced a new 2D optical profiling system to measure various optical surfaces such as free-form and aspheric optics. The non-contact PLu apex is useful to characterize large-volume mass production optics for applications including projector lenses, digital cameras, mobile telephones, DVD and Blue-ray.
The PLu apex
Sensofar’s PLu apex offers quick measurement over the sample and measure slope angles up to 65°. The PLu apex is designed on the basis of the company’s confocal profilometry technology. The technology uses the company’s Confocal Tracking algorithm that utilizes a microscope objective with high numerical aperture, and structured illumination to find the sample surface position accurately and automatically.
To detect the horizontal movement of the microscope objective, a high-resolution air-bearing stage is used. After tracking the objective, the sensor head’s vertical position is collated with the objective to reconstruct the surface profile precisely. The optical profiling system attains a 0.5 nm vertical resolution and a 1 nm horizontal resolution.
The PLu apex provides convenient and fast alignment of the sample, and various measurement objectives involving 10 to 100x ranges. The device has measurement ranges of as high as 50 mm on the vertical axis, and 0.1-100 mm in the horizontal axis.