The surfaces of laser-induced forward transfer (LIFT) printed metal structures show typical roughness characteristic of the metal droplet size (3 to 10 μm). Submicron voids are often observed in the bulk of such printed metal structures with consequences on the mechanical strength, chemical resistivity, and electrical conductivity. We present the results of our efforts to reduce surface roughness and bulk voids by controlled laser melting. We have used temporally shaped pulses from a fiber laser tunable in the range from 1 to 600 ns in order to improve the quality of LIFT printed copper and aluminum structures. For the best case shown, roughness was improved from R RMS ¼ 0.8 μm to R RMS ¼ 0.2 μm and the relative percentage of the voids was reduced from 7.3% to 0.9%. Downloaded From: http://opticalengineering.spiedigitallibrary.org/ on 05/16/2015 Terms of Use: http://spiedl.org/terms

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A new method for Q-switching an all-fiber laser is presented. It is based on induced acoustic long period grating operating on a null coupler, which acts as acoustically controlled tunable output coupler. Q-switching is achieved by switching on and off the acoustic wave in a burst mode, thereby generating laser pulses that are *400 times shorter than the acoustically controlled coupler's rise time. Output pulse energy of 22 lJ and temporal width of *100 ns were measured at a wavelength of 1.54 lm.

We demonstrate high-throughput, symmetrical, holes generation in fused silica glass using a large spot size, femtosecond IR-laser irradiation which modifies the glass properties and yields an enhanced chemical etching rate. The process relies on a balanced interplay between the nonlinear Kerr effect and multiphoton absorption in the glass which translates into symmetrical glass modification and increased etching rate. The use of a large laser spot size makes it possible to process thick glasses at high speeds over a large area. We have demonstrated such fabricated holes with an aspect ratio of 1:10 in a 1 mm thick glass samples.

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