Laser beam interaction with materials for microscale applications

Laser micromachining is essential in today’s advanced manufacturing, of e.g., printed circuit boards and electronic components, especially laser microdrilling. Continued demands for miniaturization, in particular of high-performance MEMS components, have generated a need for smaller holes and microvias as well as smaller and more controllable spot-welds than ever before. All these neeeds require smaller taper of the microholes and more stable and controlled laser micromachining process than currently available. Therefore considerable attention must be focused on the laser process parameters that control critical specifications such as accuracy of the hole size as well as its shape and taper angle, all of which highly influence quality of the laser micromachining processes. Determination of process parameters in laser micromachining, however, is expensive because it is done mostly by trial and error. This Dissertation attempts to reduce the experimental time and cost associated with establishing the process parameters in laser micromachining by employing analytical, computational, and experimental solutions (ACES) methodology