Electron and atomic force microscopy studies of femtosecond laser machining of Si, GaAs and InP

Summary form only given. The application of femtosecond light pulses to materials processing has recently become a topic of great interest. Femtosecond laser ablation dynamics has been extensively studied by techniques including time-of-flight and has also been treated theoretically. However, although numerous experimental studies have demonstrated excellent spatial control in femtosecond laser machining, relatively few investigations have explored details of the near-surface changes in crystallographic structure and the localized changes in target composition. In this study we characterize laser-machined semiconductor samples, employing a combination of scanning (SEM) and transmission (TEM) electron microscopies as well as atomic force microscopy (AFM).