Effect of inter-pulse delay time on production and size properties of colloidal nanoparticles prepared by collinear double-pulse laser ablation in liquid

Abstract

The influence of inter-pulse delay times (0-20 ns) between two collinear sequential nanosecond pulses on the production and size properties (mean size and size distribution) of colloidal nanoparticles prepared by pulsed laser ablation of a silver target in a distilled water medium has been studied. Various laser fluences at different inter-pulse delay times between two collinear pulses were used. Furthermore, for a better understanding of the effect of the double-pulse and single-pulse mode, experiments were performed. The characterization of the synthesized colloidal nanoparticles was investigated using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and UV-vis absorption spectroscopy. Our results showed that 5 ns time-delayed double-pulse laser ablation results in the production of nanoparticles with the highest concentration among the other time-delayed ablation experiments and even more than single-pulse-mode experiments. It also found that using a double-pulse approach with inter-pulse delay times in the range of 0-20 ns leads to the production of nanoparticles with smaller mean sizes and narrower size distributions in comparison to single-pulse-mode laser ablation. The effect of time overlapping between two pulses in the case of double-pulse ablation was analyzed.