Femtosecond laser fabrication of functional nanoparticle structures and their applications

It is demonstrated that femtosecond laser-induced forward or backward transfer (LIT) of nanodroplets from a thin film surface can be applied for generation of arbitrary structures consisting of spherical nanoparticles. Each nanoparticle is generated by a single laser pulse on the surface of a thin (donor) film and transferred to a precisely defined position onto a desired (receiver) substrate. Particles can be generated from different metals and dielectrics. The size of these particles can be controllably changed from a few micrometers down to a few tens of nanometers. It is shown that there are no principal limitations on a minimum distance between the fabricated particles. Each new particle can be placed in a close proximity to or even on top of the previous one. This novel method provides unique possibilities for generation of arbitrary 2D and 3D nanoparticle structures with defined optical properties and functionalities. The authors study different application of the nanoparticle structures fabricated by this method.