Rapid prototyping encapsulation for polymer light-emitting lasers

Rapid prototyping of packaging elements realized by stereolithography for the encapsulation of plastic optoelectronic devices is demonstrated. We measure the operational lifetime behavior of a polymeric laser before and after the device packaging. The operational lifetime of a polymer vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser is increased by a factor of three upon continuous pumping at an excitation fluence (250 mu J/cm(2)) three times larger than the lasing threshold, corresponding to an overall laser duration of more than 3x10(3) h at a repetition rate of 10 Hz. These findings suggest rapid prototyping stereolithography as promising highly scalable technology for the encapsulation of organic light-emitting devices.