Precision laser ablation of dielectrics in the 10-fs regime

Laser pulses in the 10-fs domain provide a quality of micromachining of fus ed silica and borosilicate glass that is unobtainable with longer pulses in the range of several 100 femtoseconds up to picoseconds. The shortening of the pulses reduces the statistical behavior of the material removal and th e ablation process thus attains a more deterministic and reproducible chara cter. The improved reproducibility of ablation is accompanied by significan tly smoother morphology. This offers the potential for lateral and vertical machining precision of the order of 100 nm and 10 nm, respectively.