Fibre laser machining for glassy carbon master mould and soft lithography based two-step printing for Ag nanoparticle structures

► The route for additive fabrication demonstrated in this paper combines the merits of laser machining, soft lithography and nanoparticles, with reduced capital investment, raw material wasting and environment pollution. ► Glassy carbon is used as a new mould material. Unlike the traditionally used mould material like silicon, no anti-stick coating is needed for replicating PDMS mould from glassy carbon master mould. ► Unlike the traditionally used methods for master mould fabrication such as photolithography, fibre laser machining demonstrated in this paper offer an alternative route for machining high quality microstructures on rigid surface, with reduced capital investment and environment pollution. ► This is the first report on the machining capability of glassy carbon by nanosecond-pulsed Yb fibre laser. ► A new cleaning method - PDMS cleaning - is demonstrated to clean the debris induced by laser machining.