Numerical Simulation of Thermal Damage Effects on Gallium Arsenide (GaAs) Induced by a 0.53 μm Wavelength Long Pulsed Laser
J. Bi, X-H. Zhang, X-W. Ni, G-Y. Jin, C-L. Li, L-J. Xu and Y-B. Chen
A finite element method (FEM) model for simulating long pulsed laser interaction with gallium arsenide (GaAs) at 0.53 μm wavelength for a 1 ms pulse width is established. The distributions of transient temperature fields before melting in different cases have been obtained and the damage characteristics were estimated. Additionally, the decomposition damage thresholds are also given. Numerical results show that heat conduction affects the whole process of long pulsed laser interaction and its damage mechanism is mainly due to thermal effects. The temperature of the centre is highest and rises fastest on the irradiated surface, where it could be damaged first. As the laser energy density increases the occurrence time of the damage gradually advances.
Keywords: Long pulsed laser, thermal damage, transient temperature fields, decomposition damage thresholds, gallium arsenide (GaAs), finite element method (FEM)