Final Report Summary - FTMEMS (Fiber-top micromachined devices: ideas on the tip of a fiber)
Fiber-top technology relies on the idea of fabricating tiny machines on the tip of an optical fiber. Light coupled from the opposite end allows one to measure, from a remote distance, any tiny movement of the machine, and, thus, any effect that may have caused that movement. This configuration allows one to develop compact instruments that adapt well to utilization in standard atmospheres and critical environments.
Thanks to the ERC StG grant, we have been able to bring this technology to full maturity. We have developed two new techniques to fabricate this kind of device at a high rate and following cost effective processes. Those probes can then be used to perform an incredibly broad range of tasks. We showed, for example, that fiber-top technology, along with its variants, can provide new ways to measure the mechanical properties of materials, and, in particular, of biological samples (an application that seems to be of great importance in tissue classification and engineering), or to make images of samples with nanometric resolution, also at high speed, and also collecting, simultaneously, information on the optical properties of the sample. Other applications fiber-top-like devices for measurements of heart cell contractile forces, fiber-top-like flow sensors for wind tunnels, fiber-top-like magnetic sensors, and fiber-top-like vibration sensors for the measurement of precursory acoustic signals in rockfall events. Finally, we introduced extremely compact fiber-top-like photoacoustic sensors, which have been shown to be the most sensitive, in their category, to detect gas contaminants.
Some of the results obtained during the past five years have been transferred to a start-up company that was created, in 2011, with the purpose of launching fiber-top technology into the market. The company, which was funded as a bootstrap enterprise with no back up from venture capitalists, now counts 7 people and has brought our technology in several countries all around the world both via business-to-customer and business-to-business channels. The project has thus been able to span the innovation path all the way through, from the sketch of an idea on the blackboard to the development of products that have been well received by the market.
Thanks to the ERC StG grant, we have been able to bring this technology to full maturity. We have developed two new techniques to fabricate this kind of device at a high rate and following cost effective processes. Those probes can then be used to perform an incredibly broad range of tasks. We showed, for example, that fiber-top technology, along with its variants, can provide new ways to measure the mechanical properties of materials, and, in particular, of biological samples (an application that seems to be of great importance in tissue classification and engineering), or to make images of samples with nanometric resolution, also at high speed, and also collecting, simultaneously, information on the optical properties of the sample. Other applications fiber-top-like devices for measurements of heart cell contractile forces, fiber-top-like flow sensors for wind tunnels, fiber-top-like magnetic sensors, and fiber-top-like vibration sensors for the measurement of precursory acoustic signals in rockfall events. Finally, we introduced extremely compact fiber-top-like photoacoustic sensors, which have been shown to be the most sensitive, in their category, to detect gas contaminants.
Some of the results obtained during the past five years have been transferred to a start-up company that was created, in 2011, with the purpose of launching fiber-top technology into the market. The company, which was funded as a bootstrap enterprise with no back up from venture capitalists, now counts 7 people and has brought our technology in several countries all around the world both via business-to-customer and business-to-business channels. The project has thus been able to span the innovation path all the way through, from the sketch of an idea on the blackboard to the development of products that have been well received by the market.