5 Common Applications Of Lasers In Electronics

NANOMETRIC STENCILS

Modern chips are not simple circuits. Your phone contains hundreds of millions of parts (even billions if it’s a very recent model), and they need to be connected just right. The wires connecting all this cannot be placed one at a time. That would take too long and be too error-prone.

Instead, the circuits are printed onto the circuit board using photolithography, which is a hi-tech use of stencils and lasers (and solvents and resins, but we won't get into that part!).

In your every day life, using a stencil means:

• choosing your paper;
• placing your stencil on top;
• spraying your paint on.

In photolithography, it looks more like:

• choosing and preparing your semiconductor and resin;
• placing your optical mask on it;
• shining your laser at it.

This “stencil” approach allows you to print the complex chip circuit in a repeatable way.