Control of Ionization Processes in High Band Gap Materials

An overview on femtosecond laser pulse shaping techniques applied to control of the initial photo-physical steps involved in materials processing is presented. First, pulse shaping methodology in frequency domain is introduced and examples of shaped pulses relevant to laser microfabrication are discussed. Then, the use of tailored femtosecond pulses to control the initial steps of laser processing of high band gap materials is demonstrated. In particular, control on basic ionization processes acting as the initial photo-physical step of the ablation dynamics is exerted by highly asymmetric femtosecond laser pulse shapes generated by Third Order Dispersion (TOD).