‘Making the impossible possible’: Gift from Posalux SA sparks micromachining innovation at Concordia

Think of precision and chances are the image you’ll conjure will be that of a Swiss watch. When it comes to some very precise research being conducted by Rolf Wuthrich, an associate professor in Concordia’s Department of Mechanical, Industrial and Aerospace Engineering and Department of Chemical and Material Engineering, the allegory is especially apt.

Wuthrich, who hails from Switzerland, doesn’t build watches, yet, thanks to a generous gift from Swiss company Posalux SA — which produces customized machine solutions for micro-technologies designed for mass production — to the Campaign for Concordia: Next-Gen Now, he is experimenting with a process called Spark Assisted Chemical Engineering.

It’s the science of etching glass on the tiniest of scales and, among other innovations, it could lead to a new generation of custom watch faces that would expand the fine-watch market beyond its current luxury niche. It could also transform the market for customized and personalized faces for smartphones, Wuthrich suggests.

“People want more and more personalized products,” he says — and it’s a rapidly growing global market.

Posalux is a worldwide company based in the small Swiss city of Biel/Bienne, a centre for Swiss industry and precision manufacturing, also known as the Swiss Silicon Valley. Rolex makes some of its parts there and SWATCH Group is also located in the French/German-speaking centre. Posalux specializes in micromachining with a focus on developing products for industry in need of high-tech equipment.

One such piece of equipment, a machine about the size of a large armoire and worth at least $200,000, sits in Wuthrich’s lab at Concordia awaiting an update so that its power supply can be converted from European to North American. It is capable of etching treated glass with tools that range from 30 to 100 micrometres, or microns, in size. (One micrometre is 0.001 mm, or about 0.000039 inches.)

The etching tools are incredibly delicate. “You just have to look at them and they break,” Wuthrich says. So, when they are being moved across the surface of the glass, whether to draw lines or drill tiny holes, it must be done very carefully — and at a very high temperature of 500- to 600-degrees Celsius.