Surface ablation efficiency and quality of fs lasers in single-pulse mode, fs lasers in burst mode, and ns lasers

In recent years, the burst-mode caught a lot of attention in the field of ultrashort-pulse laser micro machining. One of the major issues is the influence of the burst pulse number and frequency on ablation efficiency and quality. A recent publication reported of a significant increase in ablation efficiency when processing with >= 25 burst pulses at >= 100 MHz burst frequencies. This raises the question of whether processing with such high pulse densities can be attributed to non-thermal ablation, or whether a quasi-nanosecond laser ablation behavior is achieved. To answer this question, we determined ablation efficiencies as function of fluence for silicon, stainless steel, and copper and compared the ablation quality at the optimal fluence using the following laser systems: femtosecond laser operated in single-pulse mode, fs laser operated in 28-pulse-burst mode with a burst pulse frequency of 148 MHz, and a nanosecond laser with a pulse duration of 175 ns, which is identical with the temporal length of the burst pulse train. The comparison showed that the burst mode used produces similar surface morphologies and melt burrs as the nanosecond laser, but at about 2/3 of its efficiency.