Micron-sized shape measurement using a laser microscope
A paper box “zipper”
1. Application
Food is often packaged in paper boxes. Many of these boxes have perforations known as a "zipper" at the opening area. Once the zipper is pulled, the box can be easily opened along the perforation, allowing access to the contents. Managing the depth and angle of the perforations is important to help ensure that the zipper tears neatly.
2. The Olympus solution
Olympus' LEXT 3D laser scanning microscope combines multiple images from the confocal optical system, enabling observation of high-precision 3D shapes, even for very deep perforations. Thanks to dedicated objective lenses with high numerical apertures and a dedicated optical system that obtains maximum performance from the 405 nm semiconductor laser, the LEXT microscope can clearly capture the profile of a sharp slope. Because the LEXT is also an optical microscope, users can simultaneously acquire both 3D and color images; the color information from the paper box can be overlaid on the perforation to enhance the visual effect. The measurement results obtained by the LEXT microscope can also be used to adjust the dimensions of the cutting blade used to make the performations, which helps produce products that are easy to open and consumer-friendly.
Images
(1) Sample 1
(2) Sample 2
(3) Sample 3
