Thermal emission of electrons under irradiation of a gold target by a femtosecond laser pulse

Abstract

We study the effect of d-electrons on heating of a gold target upon absorption of a femtosecond laser pulse as well as on subsequent thermal emission of hot electrons. It is shown that neglecting the effect of d-electrons leads to a significant overestimation of the number of the emitted electrons. It is found that theapproximate description of the heating field in the skin layer without the inhomogeneity of the dielectric constant taken into account does not cause a significant change in the maximum temperature of the electrons at the metal surface, and has virtually no effect on the process of thermal emission.