Active Scalable Elastomer Mold to Ease Demolding of High Aspect Ratio Micro Features

Abstract

To fabricate high aspect ratio micro/nano features, demolding is more challenging than filling of melt into micro mold as solidified micro features can be easily peeled off when demolding resistance is high. Besides using anti-stick agent, using deformable mold is a new solution proposed by the authors. This paper presents a setup for testing the deformable active mold. Experimental results on micro thermal molding with the developed mold deforming system prove that the new system can successfully demold high aspect ratio micro features that can not be produced with traditional metal mold.