Abstract
Microchannels on the polymer or glass substrate are generally formed by the microfabrication technology such as the semiconductor manufacturing technology. Although control of the shape is important for the microchannel formation, many processes are required to form the microchannels and it is difficult to control the shape on the semiconductor manufacturing technology. Thus, the microchannel formation on a quartz glass substrate by using a CO2 laser were carried out. Then, relationships between microchannel shapes and laser processing conditions such as laser power, laser scanning speed and defocus amount were experimentally investigated. As a result, wide range of the microchannel shapes with the width of 150 - 400 µm and the depth of 100 - 1000 µm could be obtained by the CO2 laser processing. Moreover, a microchannel shape with about 190 µm width and 250 µm depth formed by the laser processing enabled flow of pure water. Therefore, it was revealed that various shapes of the microchannels on the quartz glass substrates could be formed by the CO2 laser, and the laser processing has possibilities for the generation of new microfluidic devices.
