Plastic injection micromolding of THz circuits and microfluidic sensors

In this paper, THz circuits and sensors are designed and experimentally implemented using a cost effective plastic injection micromolding process. Plastic resin, having low refractive index and loss in THz region, was used as the base material to manufacture THz circuits. Periodic structures such as photonic bandgap (PBG) were utilized to design THz circuits and sensors. Numerical simulations were performed using the finite element method (FEM). Design, fabrication and characterization were carried out for THz circuits operating at a center frequency of 0.25 THz. The fabricated circuits were combined with microfluidics to demonstrate sensor applications. This proposed fabrication method is useful in low cost fabrication and massive production of THz circuits and sensors.