Physical fundamentals of laser micro- and nanotechnology. Material-radiation interaction

Research on the interaction of high-intensity laser radiation with condensed media began almost right after the first lasers appeared. The processes that occur under high-power excitation are even now an object of intent study by both pure and applied physicists, who are mainly interested in the possibilities of using such excitation in laser engineering and technology.

The specific research specializations have repeatedly changed in the half century that has passed since they began, tracking the requirements of laser technology, as well as those of laser engineering itself, needed in the elements of optical channels with high radiation strength.

Traditional specializations in the study of the interaction of radiation with matter have included the following: research into the heating of a material under the action of laser radiation; the study of mechanisms and regularities of laser evaporation, plasma formation, and laser ablation; analysis of the thermochemical action of laser radiation; the elucidation of radiation breakdown mechanisms of transparent materials; and a number of others.

With time, these specializations, without losing their significance, have been supplemented by a number of new ones that constantly arise as lasers themselves develop and new possibilities appear in the study of the photophysics of intense excitations. The creation of lasers that generate ultrashort pulse widths has made it possible to conduct direct experimental research in the dynamics of rapid processes in the solid state. In the applied region, the use of supershort pulses has made it possible to significantly increase the precision of the laser processing of materials because of the absence of undesired energy dissipation in the medium due to thermal conductivity. It has become possible to develop methods of directed modification of the structure and properties of materials in micron-scale regions.

An entire series of new specializations is associated with the study of the optics of nanostructures and the features of the interaction of light with nanosize objects, which has been explosively developing in recent years. Nanoplasmonics has thus appeared, in which phenomena associated with the vibrations of conduction electrons in metallic nanostructures and nanoparticles and the interaction of these vibrations with light, atoms, and molecules is studied in order to create complex next-generation optoelectronic devices. Significant attention is being paid to the development of optical methods of controlling the formation processes of metallic nanostructures on the surface of insulators, to questions of the orientation of organic molecules under the action of light for recording information, to the analysis of the possibility of using in nanotechnology the effects of charge-equilibrium breakdown in nanosize objects under the photoexcitation of superpowerful pulses, to the study of the features of the interaction of terahertz electromagnetic waves with condensed media, etc.

Questions associated with research in the areas enumerated here are reflected in the proposed collection. The articles in this issue relate to the materials of the reports of the international conference on the Fundamentals of Laser-Assisted Micro- & Nanotechnologies (FLAMN-10), which was held at St. Petersburg from July 5 to 8, 2010. It should be pointed out that these articles are not a simple repetition of the texts of the reports but are often written as a development of the ideas that the authors presented at the conference.

Only part of the materials presented at the conference appear in this collection. Because of the limited space of the journal, the articles presented here do not completely reflect the theme of the conference. Readers interested in the contents of the original conference reports can find their complete texts collected in the Proceedings of the SPIE, vol 7996 (2011).