Dynamic evolvement and formation of refractive microlenses self-assembled from evaporative polyurethane droplets

Abstract This paper proposed a method of microfabrication for the formation of hemispherical refractive microlenses by depositing a colloid evaporative droplet onto hydrophobic surfaces. The microdroplets made of polyurethane (PU) were self-driven by surface tension to evolve their three-dimensional (3D) shapes on the surface-treated substrate. The substrates were coated with low surface energy material (Teflon) to de-pin the fluids obeying classic Young–Laplace equation until drying. Array and size-variation experiments, corresponding to different placement and droplet volume, were performed for the shaping process in which the polymers of the drops were self-assembled to be hemispherical utilizing general principle of minimal surface energy. Using the hydrophobic surfaces, plano-convex shapes with spherical curvature were fabricated with micrometer dimensions (base radius between 70 and 1016 μm). The formed structures were observed to form themselves hemispherically by the de-wetting (de-pinning) process during most of evaporation. Moreover, the gravity flatting effect was further found for the larger drop (radius = 1016 μm) when compared to that of smaller one (radius = 118 μm). In the cases, both the modeling calculations and experimental results were performed and compared to illustrate the similar geometries with the contact angle (∼70°) using dimensionless analysis. In addition, one interesting and significant finding, based on close morphological inspection of the SEM picture, showed that the resulting elongational polymer chains (width ∼200 nm) stretched (extension ∼5 μm) on the surface nearby the corner of the contact area, indicating a shear stress occurrence. Compared to those previous methods operated on (soft-) photolithographic techniques, this present one could rapidly predict and microfabricate the hemispherical formation in terms of the radius, height, and contact angle. It is also potentially appropriate for smaller and complex placement by using drop-on-demand (DOD) nozzle arrays for mass-production process.