Nanoscale heat transfer in direct nanopatterning into gold films by a nanosecond laser pulse

We investigate nanoscale heat transfer and heat-flux overlapping effects in nanopatterning through interactions between interferogram produced by 5-ns laser pulses at 355 nm and gold films. These mechanisms played different roles in direct writing of gold nanolines with different periods. Continuous gold nanolines were produced for large periods, where heat-flux overlapping is too small to effect the laser-metal interactions. Thus, the heat-transfer distance and direct laser-ablation determined the width of resultant gold nanolines. However, gold nanolines consisting of isolated gold nanoparticles were produced for small periods, where the overlapped heat-flux exceeds the threshold for removing or melting gold films.