Photoablative lithography of cellulose acetate at 172 nm: Subtractive 3D printing of biodegradable optical microstructures and molds for polydimethylsiloxane patterning

Cellulose is a glucose polymer and the most abundant biological material on earth. Because it is biodegradable and yet water insoluble, cellulose has been pursued in the past as a scaffold or base structural material for medical applications, sensors, and optical devices. Patterning of two cellulose polymers, cellulose acetate and cellulose acetate butyrate, by photoablative lithography at 172 nm has been demonstrated and is reported here. This 3D subtractive process yields complex micro- and nanostructures and optical components, including sinusoidal gratings and waveguides. Having a depth precision of 15 nm and requiring no photoresist or solvents, vacuum-ultraviolet photoetching of cellulose polymer films proceeds at a constant rate of ∼0.8 μm/h for depths of up to and beyond 25 μm when the intensity of the flat lamp is 10 mW cm−2. A polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) microimprinting process, in which photoetched cellulose serves as a negative master mold for PDMS, provides feature sizes as small as 0.5 μm and allows for optical structures such as gratings to be integrated with microfluidic devices while eliminating the existing necessity of fabricating Si molds in a cleanroom environment.