Gray-scale lithography lenses with an anti-reflective coating

We demonstrate a wafer-level, mass production-ready method for the fabrication of optical lenses. The method uses gray-scale lithography for 3D-structuring resist and subsequent plasma etching to facilitate shape transfer into the underlying glass substrate. The performance of the optical devices is further improved by coating a dielectric anti-reflective coating using a plasma-assisted reactive magnetron sputtering technique. Construction analysis of the fabricated devices was done using focused ion beam cross-sectioning and scanning electron microscopy. Finally, the imaging quality of the manufactured lenses has been proven using two customized, microscope-based setups.