Method of fabricating light guide plate template based on DMD micro-lithography

A flexible and efficient solution for fabricating the ultra-thin light guided plates (LGP) is presented. The approach is based on maskless lithography which is realized by the aid of a digital micro-mirror device (DMD). The image of microstructures created by DMD is projected by passing through a projection optical system to the substrate with a photoresist layer. After exposure, development and electroforming, a nickel template with patterned microstructures is obtained and can be used to fabricate LGP by hot embossing. The proposed method has the advantages of arbitrary microstructures created by DMD lithography and cost-effective mass production by embossing replication. A fabricated LGP with thickness down to 0.381mm was demonstrated, in which the microstructures have the resolution of 2m. The process provides a effective scheme for fabricating large format LGP with more complex microstructures.