Dr. Bill Dennis will be hosting Dr. Carl Liebig of Purdue University Department of Mechanical Engineering this week. The talk is entitled, "Damage Control: Using Coherent Phonon Oscillations to Control Material Damage."

With an optical pulse duration shorter than the time required for heat generation in materials, femtosecond laser pulses have advantages over traditional nanosecond laser systems in their ability to maximize the amount of intended damage and minimize collateral damage. The broadband nature of femtosecond laser pulses also allows them to be customized to control physical phenomena such as coherent phonon oscillations and non-thermal melting that can contribute to the damage process. This talk will introduce femtosecond pulse shaping, show how the shaped pulses can be used to control coherent phonon oscillations and discuss how to control the the material damage by manipulating the coherent phonon amplitude.