Picosecond Photon-Solid Interaction Phase Transition in Silicon

Abstract

ABSTRACTFour different regimes of photoelectric emission are observed over a vide fluence range of UV-laser pulses irradiating single-crystal silicon samples. The role of the electron-hole plasma in the nonlinear photoemission is demonstrated by temporal correlation measurements. A regime where ion thermal evaporation processes take place is observed above the critical fluence for melting. At higher laser fluences nonlinear ion acceleration is demonstrated by direct time-of-flight measurements.