Abstract
It was first shown by Simon1 that the etching of the surface of a polyimide film by an excimer laser pulse (308 nm) can be photographed at time intervals of a few nanoseconds using subnanosecond visible radiation from a dye laser that is synchronized with the UV pulse. We have used the same principle to investigate the ablation and etching in air of the surface of a polyimide (Kapton) film by pulsed 193- and 248-nm laser radiation. The scope of the experiment has been considerably extended in two ways: time delays up to many microseconds between the UV and visible laser pulses could be set up by using two excimer lasers which were coupled electrically, one of which produced the ablation pulse while the other pumped the dye laser which was the source of the subnanosecond visible pulse. Second, not only was the surface of the polymer film imaged during ablation (as in Simon's experiment), but the blast wave that rose from the surface was also photographed by changing the orientation of the camera and the dye laser beam with respect to the polymer film. The details of the experimental arrangement have been described elsewhere.2
© 1990 Optical Society of America
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