High res / small build footprint for BIOLOGY!?
Posted: Thu Aug 21, 2014 5:23 pm
Hi friendly people!
I've poked around on the forum for a while, but I haven't seen too much geared towards what I'm trying to do, so I thought I'd ask here.
I'm a bioengineer looking into using DLP for both 2.5D and 3D patterning of biopolymers at resolutions down to about 5-10 um. I'm basically building toys for cells and scaffolds to shape tissue growth. I'm looking to start with off the shelf projectors, and eventually move to the TI DLP dev. kit if I need more control. The work is definitely doable with DLP, and there are a number of nice papers where simple DLP set-ups can hit this resolution target. There are even cases where fancier DLP systems (but still no lasers) have hit 0.6 um resolutions! While these papers are nice, they aren't so great at conveying the practical ins-and-outs of their methods, and this community seems like a much better, more collaborative environment for getting advice! Many of these papers are at least a few years old now as well, so I thought I'd get some advice from people on the front lines.
Here are some questions:
1. I can blend most of the polymers I want to use with 365 nm photoinitiators, so the 365-400 nm UV band is important for me and I'm having a hard time finding reliable spectra for commercial DLP projectors. I've seen really good things about the Acer H6510BD that make me assume it already has reasonable, native UV transmission. Does anyone here have more specific data on the emission spectra of the UHP lamps used in many DLPs? I'm also considering LED sources, but they tend to be much lower power and I'm not sure how well those will jive with my photoinitiators. Thoughts?
2. My understanding is that the resolution I want requires that I reduce the build-footprint to accommodate it. I need to 'demagnify' the image output from the projector, I think. I'm looking into different methods of doing this, including placing an f/1.8 50 mm lens in front of the projector lens (decent demag) and removing the projector optics altogether and replacing them with a tube lens and 5X microscope objective. The latter arrangement should hit a theoretical resolution limit of < 2.5 um. Does anyone have advice on good methods of demagnifying, or alternative approaches?
I'll stop here for now, and thanks very much for your time and help!
Toodles,
D
I've poked around on the forum for a while, but I haven't seen too much geared towards what I'm trying to do, so I thought I'd ask here.
I'm a bioengineer looking into using DLP for both 2.5D and 3D patterning of biopolymers at resolutions down to about 5-10 um. I'm basically building toys for cells and scaffolds to shape tissue growth. I'm looking to start with off the shelf projectors, and eventually move to the TI DLP dev. kit if I need more control. The work is definitely doable with DLP, and there are a number of nice papers where simple DLP set-ups can hit this resolution target. There are even cases where fancier DLP systems (but still no lasers) have hit 0.6 um resolutions! While these papers are nice, they aren't so great at conveying the practical ins-and-outs of their methods, and this community seems like a much better, more collaborative environment for getting advice! Many of these papers are at least a few years old now as well, so I thought I'd get some advice from people on the front lines.
Here are some questions:
1. I can blend most of the polymers I want to use with 365 nm photoinitiators, so the 365-400 nm UV band is important for me and I'm having a hard time finding reliable spectra for commercial DLP projectors. I've seen really good things about the Acer H6510BD that make me assume it already has reasonable, native UV transmission. Does anyone here have more specific data on the emission spectra of the UHP lamps used in many DLPs? I'm also considering LED sources, but they tend to be much lower power and I'm not sure how well those will jive with my photoinitiators. Thoughts?
2. My understanding is that the resolution I want requires that I reduce the build-footprint to accommodate it. I need to 'demagnify' the image output from the projector, I think. I'm looking into different methods of doing this, including placing an f/1.8 50 mm lens in front of the projector lens (decent demag) and removing the projector optics altogether and replacing them with a tube lens and 5X microscope objective. The latter arrangement should hit a theoretical resolution limit of < 2.5 um. Does anyone have advice on good methods of demagnifying, or alternative approaches?
I'll stop here for now, and thanks very much for your time and help!
Toodles,
D