Molecular implantation using a laser-induced molecular micro-jet

Implantation of organic molecules into conductive organic or inorganic materials on the nanometre scale is one of the challenging problems in materials research that has to be solved. We have developed an advanced method of laser implantation suitable for producing organic molecular dots with sizes of a few hundred nanometres on organic and inorganic solid materials. This method involves transferring of organic molecules from a source film to a target material through a water-filled space-gap using a laser-induced molecular micro-jet. In this way, organic dots of Coumarin 6 (C6) molecules were successfully implanted into different target materials such as polymer, glass, copper, indium tin oxide (ITO), stainless steel, and so on. The shapes of the implanted dots as well as the shapes of the holes, caused by damage to the source or target films during laser irradiation, depended on whether water or air filled the space-gap between the films.