Control of Polymer Phase Separation by Roughness Transfer Printing for 2D Microlens Arrays

Xinyue Zhang; Naiwei Gao; Yonglin He; Shenglong Liao; Shiming Zhang; Yapei Wang

doi:10.1002/smll.201601350

Control of Polymer Phase Separation by Roughness Transfer Printing for 2D Microlens Arrays

Small. 2016 Jul;12(28):3788-93. doi: 10.1002/smll.201601350. Epub 2016 Jun 2.

Authors

Xinyue Zhang¹, Naiwei Gao¹, Yonglin He¹, Shenglong Liao¹, Shiming Zhang¹, Yapei Wang¹

Affiliation

¹ Department of Chemistry, Renmin University of China, Beijing, 100872, P. R. China.

PMID: 27254465
DOI: 10.1002/smll.201601350

Abstract

Great efforts have been devoted to the control of phase separation between blended polymers in terms of the advantages for engineering functional topologies. A simple and straightforward pathway through roughness transfer printing (RTP) is proposed to realize the control of polymer phase separation. The additional roughness difference, which is introduced by trace agarose transferred from a hydrogel stamp, offers a great effect on the rate of nucleation and coalescence orientation of polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) protrusions grown from a polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) network. Using a particular topography of agarose stamp and a proper growth time in toluene atmosphere, a 2D microlens array with high uniformity is obtained that shows great potential for optical applications. Moreover, the control of polymer phase separation was successfully extended to the collection and identification of fingerprints with a high degree of replication.

Keywords: 2D structures; anisotropic wettability; microlens arrays; separation processes.