A bioinspired method to realize transparent underwater superoleophobic and anti-oil surfaces by a femtosecond laser treatment.

The natural compound eye is a striking imaging device with a wealth of fascinating optical features such as a wide field of view (FOV), low aberration, and high sensitivity. Dragonflies in particular possess large, sophisticated compound eyes that exhibit high resolving power and information‐processing capacity. Here, a large‐scale artificial compound eye inspired by the unique designs of natural counterparts is presented. The artificial compound eye is created by a high‐efficiency strategy that combines single‐pulse femtosecond laser wet etching with thermal embossing. These eyes have a macrobase diameter of 5 mm and ≈30 000 close‐packed ommatidia with an average diameter of 24.5 μm. Moreover, the optical properties of the artificial compound eyes are investigated; the results confirm that the eye demonstrates advanced imaging quality, an exceptionally wide FOV of up to 140°, and low aberration.

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In this Letter, a novel fabrication of large-area concave microlens array (MLA) on silicon is demonstrated by combination of high-speed laser scanning, which would result in single femtosecond laser pulse ablation on surface of silicon, and subsequent wet etching. Microscale concave microlenses with tunable dimensions and accessional aspherical profile are readily obtained on the 1  cm × 1  cm silicon film, which are useful as optical elements for infrared (IR) applications. The aperture diameter and height of the microlens were characterized and the results reveal that they are both proportional to the laser scanning speed. Moreover, the optical property of high-performance silicon MLAs as a reflective homogenizer was investigated for the visible wavelength, and it can be easily extended to IR light.

We demonstrate an improved femtosecond laser irradiation followed by chemical etching process to create complex three-dimensional (3D) microchannels with arbitrary length and uniform diameter inside fused silica. A segmented chemical etching method of introducing extra access ports and a secondary power compensation is presented, which enables the fabrication of uniform 3D helical microchannels with length of 1.140 cm and aspect-ratio of 522. Based on this method, a micromixer which consists of a long helical microchannel and a y-tape microchannel was created inside the fused silica. We measured the mixing properties of the micromixer by injecting the phenolphthalein and NaOH solution through the two inlets of the y-tape microchannel. A rapid and efficient mixing was achieved in the 3D micromixer at a low Reynolds number.