Surface Exposure Technology of Metal Powder Based on an Optically-Addressed Liquid Crystal Spatial Light Modulator

Abstract

Compared with the current mature point scanning metal additive manufacturing technology, the surface exposure technology by laser additive manufacturing can accelerate the construction speed, and the short pulse laser is expected to improve the resolution. Here, a surface exposure technology processing system was constructed based on a nanosecond pulsed laser source and an optically-addressed liquid crystal spatial light modulator with a damage threshold higher than 500 mJ/cm2. The resolution of the surface exposure processing system is proved to be about 100 μm.

High laser damage threshold reflective optically addressed liquid crystal light valve based on gallium nitride conductive electrodes

“…The liquid crystal spatial light modulator (LC-SLM), as an optical device that can control the amplitude, phase and polarization of the light field in real time, has important applications in military, medical, industrial and other fields [1][2][3][4] .…”