This study introduces a straightforward electrode design featuring sharp edges with a curvature of a few hundred nanometers in radius, with which both ion accumulation and nanoparticle deposition can be observed under an alternating electrical potential. The electrodes, termed “shark-teeth electrodes,” are fabricated using a laser ablation technique optimized for facile nanostructure creation. This method involves successive, overlapping ablated disks in a thin-film of gold, producing sharp tips that generate strong electric fields. When electrically polarized in an electrolyte solution, these sharp tips form a screening layer, facilitating the observation of ion and nanoparticle behavior. A total-internal reflection microscope is employed to monitor ion accumulation on these electrodes, demonstrating their capability in iontronic microscopy. In addition, the same electrodes are used to track nanoparticle trapping under high-frequency alternating potentials. This dual functionality allows for the investigation of electrochemical and physical interactions between ions and colloidal nanoparticles, which provide valuable insights into soft matter systems, including biological systems such as cells, where similar interactions play a crucial role.

We study the expansion dynamics of super-heated material during ultra-fast laser ablation of water and gel, using transient-reflectivity microscopy. We find that the expansion dynamics of water and gel, as observed during the first few nanoseconds, are extremely similar over a large range of ablation energies. We measure the crater topography of the gel after irradiation with a single laser shot, using optical interferometric microscopy, and estimate the mass that is ejected during the ablation. We calculate the laser energy deposited during irradiation by simulating the precise spatial distribution of the electron plasma density and temperature. We link the amount of removed mass obtained experimentally with the simulations of the deposited laser energy.

We study femtosecond-laser-induced flows of air at a water/air interface, at micrometer length scales. To visualize the flow velocity field, we simultaneously induce two flow fronts using two adjacent laser pump spots. Where the flows meet, a stationary shockwave is produced, the length of which is a measure of the local flow velocity at a given radial position. By changing the distance between the spots using a spatial light modulator, we map out the flow velocity around the pump spots. We find gas front velocities near the speed of sound in air v_s for two laser excitation energies. We find an energy scaling that is inconsistent with the Sedov-Taylor model. Due to the flexibility offered by spatial beam shaping, our method can be applied to study subsonic laser-induced gas flow fronts in more complicated geometries.

We investigate the interaction of femtosecond (fs) laser pulses with single gold nanoparticles, trapped in a linear Paul trap. We study the scattering response of the particles as a function of the polarization angle of a cw laser at three different wavelengths. These measurements provide a value of the visibility that we compare with Mie theory calculations in order to obtain an estimate of the particle radius. We monitor the particle size during ultrafast laser ablation, obtaining an accurate figure for the mass loss as a function of the fs-laser dose. We discuss the particle mass loss induced by a single fs-laser shot and its relation with the number of absorbed photons.