VUV 157 nm laser ablation of composite structures

We report on the laser ablation of composite prismatic structures using a vacuum ultraviolet (VUV) 157 nm F₂ laser. Polycarbonate and CR-39 substrates have been intentionally seeded with silver wires and silicon carbide whiskers respectively. The seed particles remain attached to the underlying substrate after laser ablation, forming composite silver-polycarbonate and silicon carbide-CR-39 interfaces. Strong optical absorption at 157 nm in the polymeric substrates allows precise control over the depth between the base of the substrate and composite interface. The surface roughness of the as-received seed particles has a significant effect on the final surface quality of the ablated structures. The textured surface on the silicon carbide whiskers is resolved on the walls of the ablated structures. This is in contrast to the composite structures formed using silver wires, which have a comparatively smoother surface.     

XPS investigation on Upilex-S polyimide ablated by pulse TEA CO2 laser

Laser ablation of Upilex-S polyimide films 80 μm thick was performed in air using a pulse TEA CO₂ laser with wavelength 9.3 μm. A halo surrounding the hole was observed, which is covered with sub-micro particles. Pieces of ablation products protrude from the ablated surface, leading to considerable roughness of the ablated area. Chemical and structural changes of Upilex-S polyimide film surface irradiated by the pulse TEA CO₂ laser in air were analyzed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). Relative C content in the ablated area was found to be higher, whilst both O and N contents were lower than in the untreated area. This means that TEA CO₂ laser ablation released both the O and N atoms. Also, the peak areas corresponding with carbonyl group (C=O) in the imide system were reduced much more and a new component at 287.0 eV assigned to the amide structure (N---C=O) was detected after laser ablation. These suggest that the pyrolysis of the Upilex-S polyimide was the decomposition of the imide ring between the nitrogen/aromatic carbon atom and carbonyl carbon atom. In addition, another new component arising from >C=O groups was also detected for higher fluence (7.83 J/cm²), and its peak areas is very small. This result indicates that the slight oxidation may take place with higher fluence during laser ablation in air. Based on above-mentioned experimental results, a possible thermally-induced decomposition path of Upilex-S polyimide ablated by TEA CO₂ laser is presented.     

A two-step nanosecond laser surface texturing process with smooth surface finish

Surface texturing (for example, producing micro dimples on the surface) of mechanical parts has a great potential to improve the surface tribological properties. Surface texturing through nanosecond laser ablation has many associated advantages and hence has drawn lots of attentions. However, the produced micro dimple bottom (if through laser spot scanning) is often very rough, which may harm the surface tribological properties. In this paper, a two-step laser surface texturing process is proposed and studied, where a relatively high-fluence laser ablation step (which is to create dimples) is followed by a low-fluence laser-induced melting, melted material flow and re-solidification step (which is to smooth the ablated dimple bottom surface). The study shows that the two-step laser surface texturing process can produce dimples with very smooth bottom surfaces. The effects of laser pulse duration and scan speed in Step 2 on the dimple bottom surface morphology and roughness have also been investigated, and some very interesting physical phenomena have been found, which have been rarely reported before in literature. Some hypothesized explanations are given for the observed effects, which require future work to completely understand their underlying mechanisms.     

Atomic force microscopic characterization of films grown by inverse pulsed laser deposition

Carbon nitride films have been deposited by KrF excimer laser ablation of a rotating graphite target in 5 Pa nitrogen ambient in an inverse pulsed laser deposition configuration, where the backward motion of the ablated species is utilised for film growth on substrates lying in the target plane. Topometric AFM scans of the films, exhibiting elliptical thickness distribution, have been recorded along the axes of symmetry of the deposition area. High resolution AFM scans revealed the existence of disk-like, or somewhat elongated rice-like features of 5-10 nm average thickness and ∼100 nm largest dimension, densely packed over the whole, approximately 14 × 10 cm² deposition area. The RMS roughness of the film decreased from 9 nm near to the laser spot down to 2 nm in the outer regions. Even the highest RMS value obtained for IPLD films was less than half of the typical, 25 nm roughness measured on simultaneously deposited PLD films.     

Plasma-mediated ablation of brain tissue with picosecond laser pulses

Plasma-mediated ablations of brain tissue have been performed using picosecond laser pulses obtained from a Nd:YLF oscillator/regenerative amplifier system. The laser pulses had a pulse duration of 35 ps at a wavelength of 1.053 µm. The pulse energy varied from 90 µJ to 550 µJ at a repetition rate of 400 Hz. The energy density at the ablation threshold was measured to be 20 J/cm². Comparisons have been made to 19 ps laser pulses at 1.68 µm and 2.92 µm from an OPG/OPA system and to microsecond pulse trains at 2.94 µm from a free running Er:YAG laser. Light microscopy and scanning electron microscopy were performed to judge the depth and the quality of the ablated cavities. No thermal damage was induced by either of the picosecond laser systems. The Er:YAG laser, on the other hand, showed 20 µm wide lateral damage zones due to the longer pulse durations and the higher pulse energies.     

飞秒激光烧蚀LiNbO3晶体的形貌特征与机理研究

采用了不同能量的单脉冲和多脉冲飞秒激光对LiNbO₃晶体进行烧蚀，并刻蚀了表面衍射型光栅.通过扫描电镜和原子力显微镜观察了烧蚀点的形貌特征，首次发现利用单束飞秒激光脉冲对LiNbO₃晶体烧蚀，可以得到超衍射极限的烧蚀点，当聚焦光斑直径约为2μm、能量为170nJ的单脉冲飞秒激光作用时，烧蚀点的直径约为400nm，100nJ，17个脉冲作用时烧蚀点的直径约为800nm.同时可以观察到在能量较低的多脉冲飞秒激光作用下， LiNbO₃晶体呈现出大约200nm周期性分布的波纹状结构.实验结果表明，选择合适参数的飞秒激光脉冲可以对LiNbO₃晶体进行超衍射极限加工，这对于利用飞秒激光制作LiNbO₃基质的微纳光电子器件有十分重要的意义.     

SEM and Raman spectroscopy analyses of laser-induced periodic surface structures grown by ethanol-assisted femtosecond laser ablation of chromium

The effect of fluence and pulse duration on the growth of nanostructures on chromium (Cr) surfaces has been investigated upon irradiation of femtosecond (fs) laser pulses in a liquid confined environment of ethanol. In order to explore the effect of fluence, targets were exposed to 1000 pulses at various peak fluences ranging from 4.7 to 11.8?J?cm^–2 for pulse duration of ～25?fs. In order to explore the effect of pulse duration, targets were exposed to fs laser pulses of various pulse durations ranging from 25 to 100?fs, for a constant fluence of 11.8?J?cm^–2. Surface morphology and structural transformations have been analyzed by scanning electron microscopy and Raman spectroscopy, respectively. After laser irradiation, disordered sputtered surface with intense melting and cracking is obtained at the central ablated areas, which are augmented with increasing laser fluence due to enhanced thermal effects. At the peripheral ablated areas, where local fluence is approximately in the range of 1.4–4?mJ?cm^–2, very well-defined laser-induced periodic surface structures (LIPSS) with periodicity ranging from 270 to 370?nm along with dot-like structures are formed. As far as the pulse duration is concerned, a significant effect on the surface modification of Cr has been revealed. In the central ablated areas, for the shortest pulse duration (25?fs), only melting has been observed. However, LIPSS with dot-like structures and droplets have been grown for longer pulse durations. The periodicity of LIPSS increases and density of dot-like structures decreases with increasing pulse duration. The chemical and structural modifications of irradiated Cr have been revealed by Raman spectroscopy. It confirms the formation of new bands of chromium oxides and enol complexes or Cr-carbonyl compounds. The peak intensities of identified bands are dependent upon laser fluence and pulse duration.     

Thermal character in organic polymers with nanojoule femtosecond laser ablation

Ablation experiments with femtosecond (fs) laser pulse (pulse duration 37 fs, wavelength 800 nm) on organic polymers have been performed in air. The ablation threshold is found to be only several nanojoules. The diameters of the dots ablated in the organic polymers are influenced by the laser fluence and the number of laser pulses. It is observed that heat is diffused in a threadlike manner in all directions around the central focus region.Explanations of the observed phenomena are presented. A one-dimensional waveguide is also ablated in the organic polymers.     

Electrode patterning on PEDOT:PSS thin films by pulsed ultraviolet laser for touch panel screens

Laser dry etching by a laser driven direct writing apparatus has been extensively used for the micro- and nano-patterning on the solid surface. The purpose of this study is to pattern the PEDOT:PSS thin film coated on the soda-lime glass substrates by a nano-second pulsed ultraviolet laser processing system. The patterned PEDOT:PSS film structure provides the electrical isolation and prevents the electrical contact from each region for capacitive touch screens. The surface morphology, geometric dimension, and edge quality of ablated area after the variety of laser patternings were measured by a 3D confocal laser scanning microscope. After the single pulse laser irradiation, the ablation threshold of the PEDOT:PSS film conducted by the nano-second pulsed UV laser was determined to be 0.135±0.003 J/cm². The single pulse laser interacted region and the ablated line depth increased with increasing the laser fluence. Moreover, the inner line width of ablated PEDOT:PSS films along the patterned line path increased with increasing the laser fluence but the shoulder width increased with decreasing fluence, respectively. The clean, smooth, and straight ablated edges were accomplished after the electrode patterning with the laser fluence of 1.7 J/cm² and 90 % overlapping rate.     

Metal-on-oxide nanoparticles produced using laser ablation of microparticle aerosols

A continuous aerosol process has been studied for producing nanoparticles of oxides that were decorated with smaller metallic nanoparticles and are free of organic stabilizers. To produce the oxide carrier nanoparticles, an aerosol of 3–6 μm oxide particles was ablated using a pulsed excimer laser. The resulting oxide nanoparticle aerosol was then mixed with 1.5–2.0 μm metallic particles and this mixed aerosol was exposed to the laser for a second time. The metallic micron-sized particles were ablated during this second exposure, and the resulting nanoparticles deposited on the surface of the oxide nanoparticles producing an aerosol of 10–60 nm oxide nanoparticles that were decorated with smaller 1–5 nm metallic nanoparticles. The metal and oxide nanoparticle sizes were varied by changing the laser fluence and gas type in the aerosol. The flexibility of this approach was demonstrated by producing metal-decorated oxide nanoparticles using two oxides, SiO₂ and TiO₂, and two metals, Au and Ag.     

Varied laser induced damage phenomena of gold coated gratings for pulse compression

In this paper, gold-coated gratings for pulse compression have been prepared and their laser damage experiments have been performed. Varied laser damage morphologies have been observed: when a 60 fs-pulsed laser with energy density slightly higher than the damage threshold was used, damage morphology with a characteristic of discrete distribution of small pits was appeared. These damage pits are linearly distributed at the junction of ridges and grooves. If the laser energy density is much higher than the damage threshold, the gold films was overall ablated and the grating structure disappeared. Besides, if the gold film has poor adhesion, it was peeled off. When a 450 ps-pulsed laser with energy density slightly higher than the damage threshold was used, part of grating ridges will be ablated and an obvious line exists between the ablated area and the unchanged area. In theory, the laser induced temperature field and stress field in gold-coated gratings were calculated based on the electromagnetic field using the finite element method. It is demonstrated that the temperature and thermal stress distribution characteristics are affected by the laser heating rate and the heat diffusion time (the calculated diffusion time ranges from 6 fs to 450 ps), which determines the laser damage characteristics. The possible damage drivers have electron hydrodynamic pressure, thermal ablation and thermal stress.     

ArF-excimer laser ablation experiments on Cycloolefin Copolymer (COC)

To determine the capability of Cycloolefin Copolymer (COC) for excimer laser microstructuring, ablation experiments have been performed at 193 nm using an ArF excimer laser workstation. A matrix of square holes was structured in COC, the ablated structures were examined qualitatively and quantitatively by optical methods and scanning electron microscopy. It turned out that COC can be structured with high accuracy and is therefore suited for laser rapid prototyping of micro optical and microfluidic devices. The maximum ablation depth of COC (0.17 μm/pulse) is smaller than of PMMA (0.58 μm/pulse), but is sufficient for prototyping and allows fine depth tuning. Flat structures less than 200-μm deep nearly show no amount of redeposited material and yield smooth surfaces.     

Observation of increase in Raman intensity of surface phonon polaritons on rough surfaces of ZnTe

An increase in Raman intensity of surface phonon polaritons has been observed in free-standing thin slabs (thickness ～ 7 μm) of single- crystal ZnTe with rough surfaces by a conventional Raman-scattering technique at room temperature. The samples with various root-mean- square roughness heights have been prepared by making use of final polishing powders with different mean-grit sizes, and the surface roughness has been confirmed by measuring the intensities of the diffuse scattering of the laser light. The increase of the Raman intensity is proportional to the mean-square height of the surface roughness, and the shift of the dispersion relation is also proportional to it. The frequency shift is explained by a perturbation theory of the surface-roughness-induced scattering.     

Suppression of laser noise in CW 337μm HCN lasers

In a d.c.-discharge-excited 337 μm HCN laser, amplitude laser noise has been observed at the frequency range of 30 kHz to 1 MHz. The laser noise is classified into three types; oscillation noise having sharp peaks, broadly distributed noise having a center frequency and 1/f-noise. Characteristics of the laser noise have been studied experimentally. The laser noise is caused by small oscillation which appears on d.c.-discharge current and by random fluctuations of current and plasma density. The laser noise has been suppressed more than 30 dB by adjusting the laser parameters such as discharge current, pressure and flow rates of mixed gas (CH4₄ + N₂ + He) and added He.     

A simple analytical model of laser direct-drive thin shell target implosion

A high-neutron yield platform imploded by a thin shell target is generally built to probe nuclear science problems, and it has the advantages of high neutron yield, ultrashort fusion time, micro fusion zone, isotropic and monoenergetic neutron. Some analytical models have been proposed to interpret exploding-pusher target implosion driven by a long wavelength laser, whereas they are imperfect for a 0.35 μm laser implosion experiment. When using the 0.35 μm laser, the shell is ablated and accelerated to high implosion velocity governed by Newton's law, ablation acceleration and quasi-adiabatic compression models are suitable to explain the implosion of a laser direct-drive thin shell target. The new analytical model scales bang time, ion temperature and neutron yield for large variations in laser power, target radius, shell thickness, and fuel pressure. The predicted results of the analytical model are in agreement with experimental data on the Shenguang-III prototype laser facility, 100 kJ laser facility, Omega, and NIF, it demonstrates that the analytical model benefits the understanding of experiment performance and optimizing the target design of high neutron yield implosion.     

Influence of the laser-spot diameter on photo-ablation rates

The dependence of the ablation rate of various materials on the laser spot diameter on the sample surface has been investigated. The experiments have been performed with excimer lasers at the wavelengths 193, 248 and 308 nm. Polymers, aluminum oxide ceramics, and glasses have been ablated under vacuum and ambient atmosphere conditions. In general, all materials show a more or less pronounced increase of the ablation rate with decreasing spot diameter in the range of 10–200 μm if pulses with nanosecond pulse durations are applied. For ultrashort pulses (500 fs) at 248 nm this diameter dependence is not observed. The expansion of the ablation plume over areas of different size seems to be the main reason for this effect.     

UV laser irradiation of IR laser generated particles ablated from nitrobenzyl alcohol

Particles generated by 2.94 μm pulsed IR laser ablation of liquid 3-nitrobenzyl alcohol were irradiated with a 351 nm UV laser 3.5 mm above and parallel to the sample target. The size and concentration of the ablated particles were measured with a light scattering particle sizer. The application of the UV laser resulted in a reduction in the average particle size by one-half and an increase in the total particle concentration by a factor of nine. The optimum delay between the IR and UV lasers was between 16 and 26 μs and was dependent on the fluence of the IR laser: higher fluence led to a more rapid appearance of particulate. The ejection velocity of the particle plume, as determined by the delay time corresponding to the maximum two-laser particle concentration signal, was 130 m/s at 1600 J/m² IR laser fluence and increased to 220 m/s at 2700 J/m². The emission of particles extended for several ms. The observations are consistent with a rapid phase change and emission of particulate, followed by an extended emission of particles ablated from the target surface.     

Mass spectrometric studies of laser ablated plume from a superconducting material

The ionic species present in the laser ablated plume from the surface of the Bi_1.6Pb_0.4Sr₂Ca₂Cu₃O_ysuperconducting target have been investigated using a non-commercial laboratory developed linear time-of-flight (TOF) mass spectrometer. The recorded TOF mass spectra reveal the presence of all the atomic species of the target material, monoxide and cluster ions. The occurrence of clusters in the mass spectra is the evidence of aggregation processes at higher laser fluence. The dependence of the ionic yield of the species has been studied using the fundamental (1064 nm), second harmonic (532 nm) and fourth harmonic (266 nm) of a Nd:YAG laser. The maximum ionization of the species present in the plume is observed at 266 nm even at lower laser fluence. The effect of the laser fluence on the total and individual ionic yields of the ablated species is also presented.     

Fabrication of high-aspect-ratio microstructures using excimer laser

An excimer laser micromachining system is developed to study the ablation of high-aspect-ratio microstructures. The study examines the ablation efficiency, specifically, the impact of changing major laser operating parameters on the resulting microstructural shapes and morphology. The study focuses on glass, although results on silicon and aluminum are also included for comparison. In ablating grooved structures, the ablation depth has been observed to be linearly proportional to the operating parameters, such as the pulse number and fluence. The results specifically indicate that ablation at low fluence and high repetition rates tends to form a V-shaped cross-section or profile, while a U-shaped profile can be obtained at high fluence and low repetition rate. The ablation rate or ablated volume has then been quantified based on the ablation depth measured and the ablated profile observed. The threshold fluence has also been obtained by extrapolating experimental data of ablation rate. The extrapolation accuracy has been established by the good agreement between the extrapolated value and the one predicted by Beer's law. Moreover, a one-dimensional analytical solution has been adopted to predict the ablated volume so as to compare with the experimental data. The reasonable agreement between the two indicates that a simple analytical solution can be used for guiding or controlling further laser operations in ablating glass structures. Finally, the experimental results have shown that increasing the repetition rate favors the morphology of ablated surfaces, though the effect of repetition rate on ablation depth is insignificant.     

Experimental study on microdeposition of the copper thin film by femtosecond laser-induced forward transfer

The morphologies of the deposited dots on the 40~nm-thick copper film by the femtosecond laser-induced forward transfer that depend on the irradiated laser fluence have been studied, and the variations of orderliness of the diameter of deposited dots on the quartz substrate and forward ablated dot on the donor substrate with increasing pulse fluence have been obtained experimentally. The experimental results show that a thinner copper film would generate larger-sized ablated dot and deposited dot at the threshold fluence for transfer. By x-ray diffraction measurement, it is demonstrated that the crystal form of the transferred copper films is unaltered and the size of the crystallites is diminished.