Femtosecond laser welded nanostructures and plasmonic devices

Nanojoining, a burgeoning research area, becomes a key manufacturing of complicated nanodevices with functional prefabricated components. In this work, various nanojoining methods are first reviewed. For nanojoining of Ag/Au nanoparticles, three methods are investigated comparatively. Thermal annealing shows a two-step solid state diffusion mechanism. Laser annealing by millisecond pulses displays the thermal activated solid state diffusion. Meanwhile, two effects have been identified in femtosecond laser irradiation with different laser intensities: photofragmentation at rather high intensity (similar to 10(14) W/cm(2)) and nanojoining at low intensity (similar to 10(10) W/cm(2)). The photofragmentation forms a large number of tiny nanoparticles with an average size of 10 nm. Control over irradiation conditions at intensities near 1010 W/cm(2) results in nanojoining of most of the nanoparticles. This nanojoining is obtained through a nonthermal melting and a surface fusion welding. Joined Au nanoparticles are expected to have numerous applications, such as probes for surface enhance Raman spectroscopy. (C) 2012 Laser Institute of America.