SBIR Phase I: Quad Element Technology for Precision Machining Glass Optics

This Small Business Innovation Research Phase I project addresses the challenges, inefficiencies and need associated with a rapidly growing precision glass optics market. Glass optics are currently used in a wide range of applications such as medical devices (scopes, diagnostics, imaging, etc.), defense (ballistic windows, missile domes, etc.), consumer electronics (cell phone lenses, smart device screens, etc.) and more. The challenge associated with this market is the constant need to prototype optical glass lenses during the development phase. Today, these glass lenses are prototyped using a combination of grinding and polishing processes that are costly and time consuming. The proposed (QET) Quad Element Technology could disrupt the glass optics industry, primarily the prototyping market estimated at about $300M with a rapid growth of 50% per year. The end result would be the much quicker availability of cutting edge technology that utilizes glass optics. An example would be significantly improving the arthroscopic or endoscopic surgical tools that drastically minimizes patient trauma and recovery time during a surgical procedure or even enabling remote surgery for patients especially in third world countries. Other societal benefits will be directly realized through economic growth, providing a competitive edge, and improving product quality and profitability. The intellectual merit of this project is to enable an innovative high productivity approach to manufacturing optical quality glass. The objective of this proposal is to demonstrate proof of concept and determine the feasibility of combining four (4) distinct elements in a single machining process: mechanical, chemical, photonic and thermal. The proposed technology, termed QET (Quad Element Technology), is the first of its kind in machining processes to exploit the advantages of the four elements specifically for material removal. Till date, these four elements have been used consecutively in status quo machining processes but never concurrently. The ability of extracting and optimizing only the advantages of these four elements will enable a faster (6-8x) and cheaper (3-5x) precision manufacturing process to produce glass optics. The primary goal of the Phase I R&D is to successfully select and optimize individual components for each of the four elements proposed and demonstrate a precision turning process on optical glass. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.