Feb 15 2016
Lumentum Holdings Inc. today announced that it has dramatically reduced the size of its industry-leading PicoBlade ultrafast laser. Available today, the PicoBlade 2 provides additional capabilities in a footprint 50 % smaller than its predecessor. PicoBlade 2 will be at Lumentum’s booth #2017 at Photonics West at Moscone Center in San Francisco, Calif.
Over the last 20 years, ultrafast laser capabilities have moved rapidly from academia to a burgeoning array of industrial applications, thanks to high-quality processing enabled by ultrashort pulses. Ultrafast laser pulses, with proper energy density and wavelength, can process materials where thermal effect must be eliminated, including drilling and texturing of metals and cutting wafers, polymeric stents, display processes, and specialty glass used in mobile devices.
PicoBlade 2 leverages the successful market adoption of the PicoBlade platform, but adds a number of market-proven features that distinguish it from competitive offerings.
- FlexBurst ™ and MegaBurst ™ -- gives users the ability to split the energy of a single pulse (single pulse mode) into a group of pulses (burst mode). Correctly aligning this capability with the type of material processed can further minimize heat effect and increase the ablation rate from the cutting sample.
- AccuTrig™ -- provides accurate triggering function for “on-the-fly” processing capabilities.
- SYNC -- enables precise timing control for applications benefitting from the increased productivity achieved with high-speed galvo or line scanners.
“PicoBlade 2 represents a dramatic shift from currently available ultrafast lasers,” said Alex Schoenfelder, vice president, product line management, Commercial Lasers. “Its smaller footprint is crucial for space-constrained system integrator installations. PicoBlade 2 provides capabilities to system integrators enabling them to develop unique and proprietary processes. It differentiates their capabilities and will drive further market penetration, especially for customers with increasingly complex products targeting consumer markets.”
PicoBlade 2, like the previous PicoBlade generation, incorporates Lumentum’s proprietary, wear-and-tear free Semiconductor Saturable Absorber Mirror (SESAM®) technology. This gives PicoBlade 2 robustness and ensures excellent long-term stability. In addition, PicoBlade 2 has one of the largest frequency operating ranges -- from single shot to 8MHz. This ability, when coupled to SYNC, provides the necessary combination to leverage high-speed polygon line scanning for high-volume manufacturing.
“Collaborating with customers, we have learned first-hand their requirements for next generation applications,” said Vincent Issier, product line director, Commercial Lasers. “The PicoBlade laser platform has field-proven reliability and best-in-class beam quality. PicoBlade 2’s unique features and reduced size are already being successfully utilized by customers in a variety of manufacturing environments.”