TY - CONF A1 - Hernandez Garcia, Maria Amparo A1 - Bell, Jeremy A1 - Rurack, Knut T1 - Characterization and testing of commercial photo-resins for the fabrication of free-form optical elements with standard LCD 3D printer for advanced opto-biosensing applications N2 - Optical biosensors often show remarkable performance and can be configured in many ways for sensitive, selective, and rapid measurements. However, the high-quality and advanced optical assemblies required to read out the sensor signals, for example, Total Internal Reflection Fluorescence (TIRF) or Supercritical Angle Fluorescence (SAF) microscopy, which necessitate complex and expensive optical elements. Particularly in optical method development, researchers or developers are often confronted with limitations because conventional manufacturing processes for optical elements can be restrictive in terms of design, material, time, and cost. Modern and high-resolution 3D printing techniques make it possible to overcome these challenges and enable the fabrication of individualized and personalized free-form optical components, which can reduce costs and significantly shorten the prototyping timeline—from months to hours. In this work, we use a modern, high-resolution (< 22 µm) commercial Liquid Crystal Display (LCD)-based 3D printer, for which we spectroscopically and physically characterized commercial photo-resins printable with the LCD technique in the first step (Figure 1). The aim was not only to produce a printed element with a high surface quality that mitigates the inner filter effects caused by attenuation (high optical density (OD) due to reflection and scattering), but also to select a material with a high refractive index (RI>1.5) and high transmission values (>90% transmittance) in the visible to near-infrared spectral range (approx. 450 – 900 nm) that exhibits little or no autofluorescence. Using a selection of suitable resins, lenses and free-form optical elements were manufactured for comparison with standard glass or plastic counterparts. T2 - Europt(r)ode XVI CY - Birmingham, England DA - 24.03.2024 KW - 3D-printing KW - Optics KW - Photopolymerization KW - Sensors KW - Rapid prototyping PY - 2024 AN - OPUS4-59875 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER -