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Simulations of laser-induced dynamics in free-standing thin silicon films

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Abstract

Femtosecond-laser pulses can induce tremendous structural changes in materials. In most cases these changes are accompanied by a structural reconstruction of the materials’ surface. So far, ab initio methods were not able to simulate laser-excited materials with open boundary conditions, like, films due to technical problems. We have succeeded in overcoming these problems and in performing molecular dynamics simulations of laser-excited thin silicon films. This new stage of ab initio molecular dynamics simulations will influence widely the field of laser-excited solids in both, experiment and theory, allowing to address questions that were unreachable before. Our results indicate that for a moderate excitation strength a breathing mode is induced in the whole film in the direction perpendicular to the surface. In the high intensity regime we predict the time-evolution of experimentally accessible structure factor intensities dependent on the depth into the surface. The results indicate that the surfaces are more resilient than the film center to the femtosecond-laser excitation.

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Acknowledgements

We acknowledge gratefully the financial support of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft through the project GA465/16-1 and GA465/18-1. The needed computations were performed at the Lichtenberg High Performance Computer of the Technical University Darmstadt.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Theoretical Physics and Center for Interdisciplinary Nanostructure Science and Technology (CINSAT), Universität Kassel, Heinrich-Plett-Str. 40, 34132, Kassel, Germany

    Tobias Zier, Eeuwe S. Zijlstra, Sergej Krylow & Martin E. Garcia

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  1. Tobias Zier
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  2. Eeuwe S. Zijlstra
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  3. Sergej Krylow
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  4. Martin E. Garcia
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Correspondence to Tobias Zier.

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Zier, T., Zijlstra, E.S., Krylow, S. et al. Simulations of laser-induced dynamics in free-standing thin silicon films. Appl. Phys. A 123, 625 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00339-017-1230-9

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