Structuring of the surface layer of transparent insulators by Coulomb fields when the medium is photoionized by laser pulses

摘要

This paper predicts and theoretically describes the formation of spatially inhomogeneous mechanical stresses in the surface region of a transparent insulator when its lattice is ionized under the action of a short laser pulse. The continuum theory of elasticity is used to calculate the mean values of the components of the strain tensor and their fluctuations in a layer with an inhomogeneous random distribution of ions acting as sources of a mechanical stress field. It is shown that, depending on the degree of ionization and the thickness of the ionized layer, there are three possible types of modification of the medium, distinguished by the spatial scale of the induced structural changes. (C) 2008 Optical Sociely of America.