Comment on "laser ablation of Cu and plume expansion into 1 atm ambient gas" [J. Appl. Phys. 97, 063305 (2005)]

Abstract

A hydrodynamic model used for the study of ns-laser ablation in an ambient environment [Z. Chen and A. Bogaerts, J. Appl. Phys. 97, 063305 (2005)] was investigated and compared with an in-house developed code. After a detailed analysis of the source code and the underlying theoretical framework, significant flaws were detected in the model. It was found that the respective model as well as the ones presented in some earlier and later manuscripts is not able to simulate the ablation process, i.e., target heating, material removal, breakdown, plasma formation, and plume expansion, self-consistently. The present findings indicate that their use should be discontinued when modeling the overall ablation process. Based on existing models in the literature, alternative theoretical pathways are proposed to facilitate future computational studies of ns-laser ablation. © 2014 AIP Publishing LLC.