Laser ablative shaping of plastic optical components for phase control

A new schemes for phase control of optical components with laser ablation h as been developed. One can ablate the surface shape of optical plastic mate rial coated on a glass plate by using 193-nm laser light to control the tra nsmission wave front. The surface shape is monitored in situ and corrected to attain the desired abberation level. The irradiation fluence is approxim ately 40 mJ/cm(2), and the ablation depth/pulse is approximately 0.01 mu m/ pulse for W-cured resin. A wave-front aberration of 3.0 lambda is reduced t o 0.17 lambda for flat surface shaping. For spherical surface generation, a n aberration of 2.5 lambda is reduced to 0.2 lambda. The increase in surfac e roughness is kept within acceptable levels. (C) 1999 Optical Society of A merica.