Interference-based laser-induced micro-plasma ablation of glass

Abstract

AbstractGlass is one of the most important technical surfaces for numerous applications in automotive, optical, and consumer industries. In addition, by producing textured surfaces with periodic features in the micrometre range, new functions can be created. Although laser-based methods have shown to be capable to produce structured materials in a wide amount of materials, due to its transparency large bandgap dielectrics can be only processed in a controlled manner by employing high-power ultra-short pulsed lasers, thus limiting the employable laser sources. In this article, an interference-based method for the texturing of soda-lime glass using a 15 ns pulsed (1 kHz repetition rate) infrared (1053 nm) laser is proposed, which allows fabricating different periodic patterns with micrometre resolution. This method consists on irradiating a metallic absorber (stainless steel) put in direct contact with the glass sample and inducing locally an etching process on the backside of the glass. Then, the produced plasma at the interference maxima positions leads to the local fabrication of well-defined periodic line-like and dot-like surface patterns. The produced patterns are characterised using white light interferometry and scanning electron microscopy.