Comparing glass and plastic refractive microlenses fabricated with different technologies

We review the most important fabrication techniques for glass and
plastic refractive microlenses and we quantitatively characterize in a
systematic way the corresponding state of the art microlenses, which we
obtained from selected research groups. For all our measurements we rely
on three optical instruments: a non-contact optical profiler, a
transmission Mach Zehnder interferometer and a Twyman Green
interferometer. To conclude, we survey and discuss the different
fabrication techniques by comparing the geometrical and optical
characteristics of the microlenses, the range of materials in which the
lenses can be produced, their potential for low cost fabrication through
mass replication techniques and their suitability for monolithic
integration with other micro optical components.