Click here to view the Aspheric Optics section of our 2008 Product Catalog.

For today's sophisticated and compact laser systems, aspheres are the most powerful lenses for managing laser light. In these systems, spherical aberration is the most prevalent performance detractor. It arises from the use of spherical surfaces and artificially limits focusing and collimating accuracy.

Although it has been known for centuries that spherical geometry is not optimal for refracting light, the expense of fabricating non-spherical (aspheric) surfaces has inhibited their use. With the breakthrough of LightPath's glass molding technology, this optimal lens geometry has become a reality.

Precision Molded Optics

Molded lenses are used in a variety of photonic products: barcode scanners, laser diode to fiber couplings, optical data storage, and medical lasers, to name a few. In many of these applications, the material of choice is optical glass because of its durability and performance stability over a wide environmental range. High power transmittance is also an added advantage.

Hybrid Achromatic Aspheric Lenses
LightPath can extend the range of optimization on a lens by molding a diffractive pattern in the surface of the lens. This allows for a greater range of wavelength optimization and better achromatic performance.

Molded In Place (MIP) Lenses
LightPath's lenses can be molded directly into metallic holders, allowing the lenses to be welded or soldered into the package and eliminating the need to use epoxy.

Standard Anti-Reflective Coatings
LightPath offers a variety of multilayer broadband coatings to reduce the back reflection from a nominal 6% for uncoated lenses. The choice of which AR coating is appropriate depends on the type of glass the lens is made from and the wavelength at which the lens will be used.

Blue Laser Collimating Lens
LightPath's new 352673 molded glass aspheric lens is optimized to collimate Nichia's^® blue laser diode, and is manufactured and designed to meet extremely stringent optical standards.

By utilizing LightPath's molded lens technology, it is now possible to manufacture lens arrays with high precision. Unlike etched lens arrays, where there is a great deal of non-uniformity from array to array, molding will consistently produce the same structure and performance from prototype to large production builds.

LightPath's lens technology creates a simple solution to circularize and collimate many of the available laser diodes. By positioning the lens very close to the laser chip itself, these lenses provide a small circular and collimated beam, providing a very elegant and compact solution. Custom designs are available covering wavelengths from 385nm to 1.7 microns.

LightPath has introduced a new line of molded glass aspheric lenses utilizing the ECO550 glass, a lead-free alternative to traditional moldable glasses. This glass is fully RoHS compliant, in accordance with the new European restrictions on hazardous substances.

The new lenses will be drop-in replacements for the existing LightPath aspheric lenses and will have the same first order optical properties. To view specifications for LightPath's RoHS compliant aspheres, please see pages 18-29 of our product catalog.