Surface damage induced by micropores in transparent ceramics under nanosecond laser irradiation.

The increasing use of transparent ceramics in laser systems presents a challenge; their low damage threshold has become a significant impediment to the development of powerful laser systems. Consequently, it is imperative to undertake research into the damage sustained by these materials. Micropores, the most common structural defects in transparent ceramics, inevitably remain within the material during its preparation process. However, the relationship between the density and size of these micropores and their impact on nanosecond laser damage threshold and damage evolution remains unclear. In this study, we utilize the annealing process to effectively manage the density and size of micropores, establishing a correlation between micropores in relation to damage thresholds. This study confirms for the first time that micropores significantly contribute to laser damage, comparing and analyzing the damage morphology characteristics of both front and rear surfaces of transparent ceramics. It also presents, potential mechanisms that may contribute to these differences in damage. This paper offers guidance for controlling micropores during the preparation and processing of transparent ceramics with high laser damage thresholds. The findings are expected to further improve the anti-nanosecond laser damage capabilities of transparent ceramics.

Determining femtosecond laser fluence for surface engineering of transparent conductive thin films by single shot irradiation.

In recent years, there has been increasing interest in optoelectronic applications of transparent conductive oxide (TCO) thin-film-based materials and devices fabricated using patterning techniques. Meanwhile, femtosecond laser processing is a convenient method that further improves the performance of TCO-based functional devices and expands their application prospects. In this study, we proposed a simple and effective strategy to determine the fluences required for laser processing TCOs. We investigated the modification of an indium tin oxide (ITO) film induced by a femtosecond laser (45/150 fs, 800 nm) at different pulse fluences. The results reveal that the laser modification of ITO films is highly dependent on the irradiated pulse fluences. Several distinct types of final micro/nanostructures were observed and may be attributed to superficial amorphization, spallation ablation, stress-assisted delamination, boiling evaporation, and phase explosion. The final micro/nanostructures were studied in detail using optical microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy and a surface profiler. At a lower fluence above the melting but below the ablation threshold, a laterally parabolic amorphous layer profiled with maximum thicknesses of several tens of nanometers was quantitatively attained. At a higher fluence, stress-assisted delamination and superheated liquid-induced micro-honeycomb structures emerged. Furthermore, the electron and lattice temperature evolutions were also obtained using a two-temperature model to prove the ablation mechanism and ascertain the micro/nanostructure formation principle. The predicted surface temperatures confirmed film amorphization without ablation below 0.23 J/cm2. These results reveal the interaction mechanism between femtosecond laser pulse and ITO film including the competition between the free electron heating of intraband transition and the multiphoton absorption of the interband transition, which promotes the potential applications for femtosecond laser processing TCO films and other wide-band-gap semiconductors such as photodetectors, solar cells, UV-light-emitting diodes, and flat-panel displays.

Study on defect-induced damage behaviors of ADP crystals by 355†nm pulsed laser.

High-quality ammonium dihydrogen phosphate (NH4H2PO4, ADP) crystals were grown in Z direction and in defined crystallographic direction (θ=90°, φ=45°) by the rapid growth method, respectively. Defect-induced damage behavior in 355 nm of three types of ADP samples cutting in type-II matching and third harmonic generation direction from the as-grown crystals were investigated, including the initial laser induced damage (LID) characteristics and the physical and chemical properties of defects which serve as the damage precursors. The evaluations of damage behaviors include the "sampling" laser induced damage threshold (LIDT) by 1-on-1 and R-on-1 methods, bulk damage growth and bulk damage morphology. UV-visible transmittance spectrum, ultraviolet absorption spectrum, fluorescence spectrum, positron annihilation spectrum and the online light scattering measurements were carried out to investigate the defect-induced damage behavior in ADP crystals. The study will provide a reference for the investigations on laser induced damage properties of ADP crystals in short wavelength.

Laser-damage characteristics of Nd:glass active mirrors.

The active-mirror architecture is widely used in high-power laser systems. In this study, the laser-damage characteristics of Nd:glass active mirrors are investigated. They are exposed to nanosecond 1064 nm laser incident from the Nd:glass. The laser-induced damage thresholds (LIDTs) of the coated sides are lower than those of the uncoated sides. The LIDT of the active mirror whose substrate is manually scrubbed is lower than that of one whose substrate is ultrasonically cleaned. Analysis shows that the absorbing surface defects on the manually scrubbed Nd:glass surface are responsible for the lower LIDT of the active mirror prepared via manual scrubbing, while the subsurface defects in the ultrasonically cleaned Nd:glass substrate are the main reason for the damage of the active mirror prepared via ultrasonic cleaning. The strong standing-wave electric field near the interface between the coating and the Nd:glass substrate is another factor affecting the damage of the active mirror.

Bioactivity of umbilical cord blood dendritic cells and anti-leukemia effect.

OBJECTIVE: We investigated the effect of umbilical cord blood dendritic cells (DCs) on in vitro proliferation, immunophenotypes and levels of homologous cytokine-induced killer cells (CIK) and the toxicity on leukemia cells. METHOD: Mononuclear cell-induced DC-CIK cells derived from umbilical cord blood were collected and co-cultured in the proportion of 1:5. Cord blood CIK cells or peripheral blood DC-CIK cells were used as control. Phenotypes were analyzed by flow cytometry; vial cell counting was performed using trypan blue, and the killing activity of effector cells against leukemia cells was measured by MTT assay. The levels of interferon-r (IFN-r), tumor necrosis factor-a (TNF-α) and interleukin-12 (IL-12) were determined by ELISA. RESULTS: The proliferative capacity of DC-CIK cells was obviously improved compared with cord blood CIK cells and peripheral blood DC-CIK cells (P<0.05, P<0.05). During the co-culture of cord blood DC-CIK cells, the ratios of CD 3 (+) CD 8 (+) and CD 3 (+) CD 56 (+) cells were obviously higher than that of CIK cells under the same conditions (P<0.05). On day 3 of co-culture, the levels of IL-12, IFN-r and TNF-a in cultured supernatant of cord blood DC-CIK cells were all higher than those secreted by CIK cells cultured alone (P<0.01, P<0.05, P<0.05). When the effector to target ratio was 2.5-20:1, the killing effect of cord blood DC-CIK cells against each subtype of acute leukemia cells was obviously higher than that of CIK cells (P<0.05). No significant differences in killing effect were observed for different subtypes. This finding was consistent with the killing effect of peripheral blood DC-CIK cells against leukemia cells. CONCLUSION: Cord blood DCs can enhance the proliferative capacity of homologous CIK cells and its anti-leukemia effect. Though cord blood DC-CIK cells showed a higher proliferative capacity than peripheral blood DC-CIK cells, the two types of DC-CIK cells did not differ significantly in terms of cytoxicity. With a high availability and the low probability of graft rejection reaction, cord blood DC-CIK cells have a brighter prospect for application in immunotherapy.

Method of mitigation laser-damage growth on fused silica surface.

A reliable method, combining femtosecond (fs) laser mitigation and chemical (HF) etching, has been developed to mitigate laser-damage growth sites on a fused silica surface. A rectangular mitigation site was fabricated by an fs laser with a raster scan procedure; HF etching was then used to remove the redeposition material. The results show that the mitigation site exhibits good physical qualities with a smooth bottom and edge. The damage test results show that the growth threshold of the mitigation sites increases. Furthermore, the structural characteristic of samples was measured by a photoluminescence (PL) spectrometer, and the light intensification caused by damage and mitigation sites was numerically modeled by the finite-difference time-domain (FDTD). It revealed that the removal of damaged material and structure optimization contribute to the increase of the damage growth threshold of the mitigation site.

Investigations on the catastrophic damage in multilayer dielectric films.

HfO2/SiO2 coatings are always fluence-limited by a class of rare catastrophic failures induced by a nanosecond laser with a wavelength of 1053 nm. The catastrophic damage in HfO2/SiO2 coatings behaves as the damage growth with repeated laser irradiation, and thus eventually limits the mirror performance. Understanding the damage processes and mechanisms associated with the catastrophic damage are important for reducing the occurrence of the catastrophic failure and allowing the HfO2/SiO2 coatings to survive at the high fluence required by high laser systems. The rough damage behavior of the catastrophic failure at the proper critical fluence is present. The pit and delamination in the catastrophic failure are investigated to find the possible reasons leading to the catastrophic failure. The experimental results indicate that nodular defect originated from the substrate easily incurs the catastrophic damage. The electric field enhancements of the pit and the substrate impurities may contribute to this phenomenon. The delamination is always present on the left of the pit when laser irradiates from left to right at oblique incidence, which may be related to the plasma plume toward the laser incidence.

Etching of subwavelength periodic stripes by using a nanosecond laser pulse.

In this study, porous silica films, which have particle accumulation microstructure, were prepared using the sol-gel method. For comparison, compact silica films were deposited using the electron-beam-heating method. These films were then irradiated using nanosecond-pulsed laser beams with wavelengths of 1064 and 532 nm. Laser-induced damage thresholds were recorded and the film microstructures, as well as damage photographs, were observed using scanning electron microscopy. The experimental results show that different kinds of stripes formed on the surface of the silica films with particle accumulation structure. A kind of subwavelength periodic straight stripe was observed in the case of the 1064 nm wavelength, whereas another kind of annular stripe around the small damage pits was observed in the case of the 532 nm wavelength.

Femtosecond laser-induced damage of HfO2/SiO2 mirror with different stack structure.

Laser-induced damage of the "standard" (λ/4 stack structure) and "modified" (reduced standing-wave field) HfO(2)/SiO(2) mirrors were investigated by a commercial 800 nm Ti:sapphire laser system. Three kinds of pulse duration of 50 fs, 105 fs, and 135 fs were chosen. The results show that the single-shot damage threshold of the "modified" mirror was about 14%-23% higher compared to that of the "standard" mirror. A model based on the rate equation for free electron generation was adopted to explain the threshold results. It took in account the transient changes in the dielectric function of material during the laser pulse. The simulated threshold agreed with the experimental very well. Besides, for two kinds of mirror, typical breakdown craters for both the single-shots and multi-shots damage tests reveal striking distinct characteristics. Interestingly, the multi-shots damage crater with zigzag-like edge was observed only on the "standard" mirror. These phenomena were illustrated reasonably by the distribution features of the electric field intensity within the mirrors.

Effect of nanosecond laser pre-irradiation on the femtosecond laser-induced damage of Ta2O5/SiO2 high reflector.

The effect of nanosecond laser pre-irradiation on the femtosecond laser-induced damage behaviors of 800 nm 0° AOI Ta(2)O(5)/SiO(2) high reflectors fabricated by e-beam evaporation was explored. Laser pre-irradiation was carried out by Raster-scanning with scanning mode of 1-on-1 and scanning velocities timed such that there was a beam overlap at 70% of the peak fluence, utilizing 5 Hz 1064 nm 12 ns Nd:YAG fundamental lasers. Femtosecond laser damage was investigated by 1 kHz 800 nm 135 fs Ti: sapphire laser system with 1-on-1 mode test. The results indicated that nanosecond laser pre-irradiation did not promote the femtosecond laser-induced damage threshold of reflectors. Instead, the thresholds of all the samples with various fluence steps for pre-irradiation were reduced by about 20%. Furthermore, the damage morphologies were analyzed by optical microscope, SEM and AFM, which displayed deterministic field induced breakdown characteristics. To explain these phenomena, a theoretical model including photoionization, avalanche ionization, and decays of electrons was built to simulate the evolution of electron density in the conduction band. Field ionization mechanism was considered to dominate the femtosecond laser damage process, while the electronic defects induced by nanosecond laser pre-irradiation accelerated the femtosecond laser damage evolution.

Characteristics of plasma scalds in multilayer dielectric films.

Plasma scalding is one of the most typical laser damage morphologies induced by a nanosecond laser with a wavelength of 1053 nm in HfO(2)/SiO(2) multilayer films. In this paper, the characteristics of plasma scalds are systematically investigated with multiple methods. The scalding behaves as surface discoloration under a microscope. The shape is nearly circular when the laser incidence angle is close to normal incidence and is elliptical at oblique incidence. The nodular-ejection pit is in the center of the scalding region when the laser irradiates at the incidence angle close to normal incidence and in the right of the scalding region when the laser irradiates from left to right at oblique incidence. The maximum damage size of the scalding increases with laser energy. The edge of the scalding is high compared with the unirradiated film surface, and the region tending to the center is concave. Plasma scald is proved to be surface damage. The maximum depth of a scald increases with its size. Tiny pits of nanometer scale can be seen in the scalding film under a scanning electronic microscope at a higher magnification. The absorptions of the surface plasma scalds tend to be approximately the same as the lower absorptions of test sites without laser irradiation. Scalds do not grow during further illumination pulses until 65 J/cm(2). The formation of surface plasma scalding may be related to the occurrence of the laser-supported detonation wave.

Geometrical characteristics and damage morphology of nodules grown from artificial seeds in multilayer coating.

Nodules have been planted in an HfO(2)/SiO(2) multilayer system with absorptive gold nanoparticle seeds located on the surface of a substrate. The topography of nodules was scanned by an atomic force microscope and imaged by a scanning electron microscope. The underlying characteristics of nodules were revealed by a focused ion beam. The cross-sectional profiles reveal that nodules grown from small seeds have a continuous boundary and better mechanical stability. A laser-induced damage test shows that nodules decrease the laser-induced damage threshold by up to 3 times. The damage pits are exclusively caused by nodular ejection and triggered by the absorptive seeds. The distribution of electric field and average temperature rise in the nodules were analyzed. Theoretical results met experimental results very well. The strong absorptive seed and microlens effect of the nodule play important roles in laser-induced damage of a planted nodule.

Further investigation of the characteristics of nodular defects.

To increase the understanding of the damage sensitivity of nodular defects and provide exact evidence for theoretical study, the structures and the damage behavior of nodular defects in electron-beam deposited mirrors of HfO(2)/SiO(2) are systemically investigated with a double-beam microscope (focused ion beam, scanning electron microscope). Nodular defects are classified into two kinds. In one kind the boundaries between nodules and the surrounding layers have become continuous for the last deposited materials, and in the other there are discontinuous boundaries between nodules and the surrounding layers. Nodular defects of the first kind typically have low domes, and the second have high domes. Laser damage experiments show that nodular defects of the first kind usually have a high laser resistance, and the laser-induced damage thresholds are limited in the second class of nodules. The dominant parameter of nodular defects related to damage is the height of the nodular defect.

Temperature field analysis of TiO2 films with high-absorptance inclusions.

To deduce the location of absorptive inclusions in thin films, temperature distributions in pure TiO(2) films and TiO(2) films with high-absorptance inclusions are analyzed based on temperature field theory. According to our theoretic simulations, the surface temperature rise increases when absorptive inclusions are incorporated into thin films and shows different values for different inclusions. With the increase of inclusion thickness, the surface temperature rise varies and has a maximum value. A potential method is presented to deduce the location of absorptive inclusion through calculating the surface temperature rise at two modulated frequencies, if it is possible to know in advance the inclusion material or to prejudge this from a thin-film deposition process.

Effect of multiple wavelengths combination on laser-induced damage in multilayer mirrors.

The damage effect of the combined irradiation of 1omega and 3omega in multilayer films was investigated. The experiments were held in both the Laser Induced Damage Threshold (LIDT) mode and the damage probability mode. Moreover, the effect of the laser pre-conditioning was also discussed. It was found that with two wavelengths illumination simultaneously, the number of the sensitive defects still govern the damage probability of the samples, and the energy absorption of the defects to pulse laser is a basic process in causing damage. Additionally, correlative theory models were built to explain the experimental results.

Temperature field analysis of single-layer TiO2 films.

A method is presented to evaluate optical absorption at a random wavelength by calculating temperature distribution in single-layer TiO(2) films. Temperature distribution in single-layer TiO(2) films was analyzed based on temperature field theory. Through our calculations, optical absorption variation was obtained to be similar to that of surface temperature rise in films. The surface temperature rise depends on film thickness, refractive index, extinction coefficient, specific heat, and thermal conductivity. Furthermore, the optical absorptions of the same single-layer TiO(2) film at different wavelengths were deduced. As an example, the surface temperature rises were calculated for the 19 single-layer TiO(2) films, which had been prepared by 12 different laboratories for the annual meeting of the Optical Society of America in 1986. The results agree well with the measured optical absorptions.