Optical and thermal energy transport from a NSOM probe to a pure silicon target under intense ns pulsed light

An integrated wave-based optical analysis and diffusion-based thermal analysis are constructed to understand the optical and thermal energy transport from a near-field scanning optical microscope (NSOM) probe to a pure silicon target. Based on a comparison between the simulated results and experimentally observed melting structure on the silicon targets in the previous study, it is concluded that a direct contact between the NSOM probes and the target occurs when high intense nanosecond (ns) laser pulses are carried with NSOM probes. Significant thermal energy transport from the NSOM probe to the Si target occurs during the direct contact and is responsible for the melted structure on silicon targets observed in previous experiments. It is also predicted from the integrated optical-thermal analysis for the NSOM probes that (a) the thermal energy transport from the NSOM probe to the target can be orders higher than the near-field optical energy transport under intense ns laser pulses, (b) light transport efficiency from the NSOM probe to the Si target is a strong function of the tapering angle, aperture size and the constructing material of the metal cladding of the probe, (c) the highest temperature of the NSOM probe is a weak function of the tapering angle and aperture diameter of the NSOM probe. However, the maximum temperature of the NSOM can be significantly changed by selecting the appropriate cladding material of the NSOM probe.