Magneto-absorption effects in magnetic-field assisted laser ablation of silicon by UV nanosecond pulses

• Main Authors: Farrokhi, Hamid, Gruzdev, V., Zheng, Hong Yu, Rawat, R. S., Zhou, Wei
• Other Authors: School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: 2016
• Subjects: Magnetic fields; Laser ablation
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10356/85026; http://hdl.handle.net/10220/41085
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

A constant magnetic field can significantly improve the quality and speed of ablation by nanosecond laser pulses. These improvements are usually attributed to the confinement of laser-produced plasma by the magnetic field and specific propagation effects in the magnetized plasma. Here we report a strong influence of constant axial magnetic field on the ablation of silicon by 20-ns laser pulses at wavelength 355 nm, which results in an increase of ablation depth by a factor of 1.3 to 69 depending on laser parameters and magnitude of the magnetic field. The traditional plasma effects do not explain this result, and magneto-absorption of silicon is proposed as one of the major mechanisms of the significant enhancement of ablation.