Measurement of femtosecond laser ablation by soft X-ray laser interferometory and reflective imaging

Nishikino, Masaharu; Hasegawa, Noboru; Ishino, Masahiko; Yamagiwa, Mitsuru; Kawachi, Tetsuya; Minami, Yasuo*; Terakawa, Kota*; Takei, Ryota*; Baba, Motoyoshi*; Suemoto, Toru; Yamamoto, Minoru*; Onishi, Ryo*; Tomita, Takuro*

The dynamics of the femtosecond laser ablation is still not clear at the early stage. Several studies on the time-resolved imaging of femtosecond laser ablation process have been performed on various materials. In this study, we have demonstrated a pump and probe imaging of the metal surface morphology during the femtosecond laser ablation by using the laser-driven plasma induced soft X-ray laser (SXRL) as a probe beam. The pumping laser used for ablation was a Ti:Sapphire laser system based on chirped pulse amplification. The pump beam had a Gaussian profile and the focal spot size on the metal surface was about 70 micron at FWHM. The dependence for the pump laser fluence of the ablation surface expansion and the surface condition (roughness and density gradient) were observed from the soft X-ray interferogram and reflective image, respectively.