NSF Award
9983366
This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) project continues the Pulsed Laser Deposition project using a femto-second or sub pico-second pulsed laser. The sub pico-second regime is a recent (just a few years old)development in the laser industry. As technology progresses these lasers are becoming more common to both the end user and the commercial manufacturer. There are now solid state femto-second lasers available in the product line of some well known laser companies. The recent advances made in the production and sales of the new sub pico-second laser and the results achievable by these lasers have opened up new opportunities in tribological coatings. The Phase I results demonstrated superior hardness using the sub pico-second laser as compared to the traditional nano-second lasers. The coatings were also much smoother when observed under a scanning electron microscope. These initial findings suggest a need to continue the study for applications in the tool and space industries as well as the military. Coatings with such improved performance would be considered a significant contribution to both the scientific and industrial communities.<br/><br/>Current coatings are short lived and therefore expensive to maintain. A longer life coating, even if it was more expensive, would provide significant savings do to the life of the tool, device or machine. Some devices are not even practical to make do to poor performing coatings. Coatings produced using a sub pico-second laser source will change that.
