Heat accumulation in metals under femtosecond irradiation: simulation and experimentation

AbstractUltrafast laser micromachining results depend on both the processing parameters and the material properties. The thermal effects are negligible if a good combination of processing parameters is chosen. However, optimizing the processing parameters to achieve the required surface quality on a given material can be quite complex and time consuming. Within the framework of the European LAMpAS project, we developed a model to estimate the heat accumulation on a surface as a function of the laser fluence, scanning speed and line pitch. The simulation results were correlated with experimental ones. The predictions of the model allow evaluation of the heat distribution on the surface, and optimize the ultrafast laser micromachining strategy, yielding negligible thermal damage.