Ultrashort pulse laser ablation of dielectrics

In this research, clear connections have been established between the thresholds and mechanisms of the damage and white-light generation upon femtosecond laser irradiation of wide-bandgap transparent materials such as Corning Willow glass. The experimental results demonstrate co-existence of several ablation mechanisms which can be separated in time. To gain insight into the processes triggered by laser radiation in glass, sophisticated numerical simulations have been performed.

(a) The crater volume as a function of laser fluence for irradiation with one (triangles) and five (squares) pulses. (b) Craters produced by 5 laser pulses at the regimes below (left) and above (right) the breakdown threshold. (c) Schematic illustration of accumulation effects leading to cleaner crater morphology with number of pulses at high laser fluences.

¹HiLASE Centre, Institute of Physics ASCR, Za Radnicí 828, 25241 Dolní Břežany, Czech Republic
²S.S. Kutateladze Institute of Thermophysics SB RAS, 1 Lavrentyev Ave., 630090 Novosibirsk, Russia
³Regional Centre of Advanced Technologies and Materials, Joint Laboratory of Optics of Palacký University and Institute of Physics ASCR, Palacký University, 17. listopadu 12, 771 46 Olomouc, Czech Republic
⁴Joint Laboratory of Optics of Palacký University and Institute of Physics AS CR, 17. listopadu 50a, 772 07 Olomouc, Czech Republic
⁵Institute of Physics ASCR, Na Slovance 1999/2, 18221 Praha, Czech Republic