Laser structuring of thin metal films

Abstract This work presents results on structuring of thin gold/silver (AuAg) composite film by laser pulses with different pulse durations. Laser systems that generate millisecond (50 ms), nanosecond (15 ns), picosecond (10 ps), and femtosecond (100 fs) pulses are used in the experiments. The laser wavelength is 1064 nm for ms, ns, and ps regime and 800 nm for the femtosecond one. The metal films are deposited by pulsed laser deposition technique on quartz substrates using nanosecond laser pulses. The surface morphologies induced by variation of the processing parameters as pulse duration and applied laser fluence are studied. It is found that the laser processing results in formation of variety of micro- and nanostructures, with characteristics that can be controlled by the laser parameters. The obtained structures express optical properties defined by the plasmon excitation. The fabricated structures show efficiency as active substrates in Surface Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy.